Prism
by Evenstar120
Summary: When the earth falls, hope seems lost. But where there is life, there is hope. Billy, Kim, and Jason have their private moments of doubt. CHAPTER 8 (finally) UP!
1. Default Chapter

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Prism

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Disclaimer: I know, I know - they're not mine. They belong to Saban or whoever bought the rights.

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Author's note: I rate this PG-13 for violence and the like. I deviate from the original storyline in places.

The chisel tapped away in a steady rhythm, carefully prying loose a chip of rock. The work was delicate and painstaking, and to loose concentration could mean damaging the crystals embedded behind the rock. If that happened…he shuddered, both not really wanting to think about those possibilities, as well as feeling the cold dampness of the cavern on his bare chest. 

The mines were deep, seemingly endless. It was dark, and moisture seemed to drip off the walls. He sighed. There were other parts of the mines that were drier, but he was glad not to be put in those, since several sections near that part had collapsed, burying many workers, including one he'd begun a guarded friendship with. More workers had been brought in, not to recover the bodies of the men and women killed in the narrow shaft, but to clear the rubble and reopen the shafts. The bodies were carted out with the stones, and left among them. Later that night, families had stolen over in secret to claim the bodies of loved ones and bury them in unmarked graves, the locations known only to themselves. 

Everyone called themselves 'workers'. It was better than admitting they were slaves somehow. It soothed their minds, at least allowing them to maintain the illusion of hope, the kind of hope that got them through the day. When the Empress had come, the young man remembered, he had climbed from the rubble (rubble of what? He wondered silently. He remembered well that he'd seen wreckage everywhere, but for the life of him, he could not remember what had been there in the first place to be broken so badly) dazed and nauseated, and immediately grabbed by a quadroon of strange beings. He had fought hard, but eventually, they overcame him and forced him to into a crowded huddle with hundreds of others. They were sorted out, one line for kitchen work, one for servants to the Empress herself (these were the ones who, either terrified or naturally toadies, voluntarily acknowledged the Empress' supremacy), and many of the rest were bound for hard manual labor. 

As they all found out the next day after a poor supper and little sleep from sleeping on the hard ground in a light, cold rain, the work was hard. Everyone was issued a shovel or a pickax and instructed to dig. And dig they did. Eventually, after many days of work, one group broke into a deep cave. Shuttled down into the bowels of the cavern, the Empress commanded them through her servants to carefully remove the crystals that grew along the walls of the cavern.

After the cave was located and the operation truly began, quality of life had improved a very small bit. A couple of groups of workers spun off to begin building barracks so that the workers could sleep under shelter instead of out in the open (the Empress had been most displeased when a fairly large number of her workforce had died over the first several weeks of exposure and illness and had thus grudgingly granted that some sort of shelter was necessary. Her workers were expendable, but not at such a vast rate). 

"Tommy!" came a soft hiss in his direction, breaking his thought. He glanced over at the girl beside him. Her striking paleness stood out in the darkness, and he gave an almost imperceptible nod so as not to attract any attention to their interaction.

Following her eyes to the entrance of the cavern, he noted the foremen coming down to inspect their progress. Grateful for the warning, he smiled slightly at her. _She seems so familiar,_ he pondered, thinking perhaps that she had been one of the women he'd dreamed of the night before. Perhaps not - in his dream, there had been a quality to the people, including the one who looked like her, that he could not describe. 'Strangely bright' was the closest he could come, but that did not do justice to the richness of the quality. It had changed her skin and her hair, but especially her eyes and clothing. 

Reluctantly, he forced his mind back to his work. It always seemed that the beasts that served as the Empress' foremen held some sort of grudge against himself and the girl. They were the only workers the foremen used specific, proper names with. Of course, everyone had a name that all of the other workers called them by to discern identities, but the beasts neither knew nor cared about these, simply calling everyone "stupid" or "idiot", or a number of other less pleasant things. However, whenever they looked at him or the girl, they always called them specifically: he was Tommy, whatever that meant. The girl, he recalled, was usually called "Kat". 

Tommy winced as he heard the crack of the armored monster's blade striking Kat on the back. Kat bit back a cry. Usually, that would only bring another blow, and besides, this one had been with the flat of the blade. It would probably bruise up nicely, but other then that, not be too bothersome. As the beasts left the cavern, satisfied with the progress apparently, Tommy leaned over to Kat. "Are you alright?" he whispered.

"Yes," Kat whispered back. Tommy personally found her unfamiliar accent rather intriguing. He could recall little of his past life, but he was fairly certain that the girl came from someplace other than where he'd been brought up. More talking was dangerous, so Tommy turned back to working in silence. _Someday,_ he vowed, _I'm going to fight back. For all those that have died. And for all those that still live._

It was not that no one attempted to fight back against the foremen or even the Empress, who enforced the system of slavery over them, but all who had tried were killed. If they were lucky, death came swiftly. If not, it was a lengthy, drawn out torture in front of the Empress they'd tried to overthrow. Tommy knew that to plausibly attempt something effective, it would take a careful, trust-worthy alliance. 

It scared him even to think about asking anyone to join him, though. Among the workers were plenty of snitches, and to ask the wrong person would quash any rebellion quickly and effectively, him along with it. Not to mention, the mines were dangerous, and someone you trusted one day could be gone the next. Tommy sighed. He had thought often about the pale girl, Kat. Something about her - maybe it was just someone he remembered in his dreams that resembled her - but in any case, he wanted to trust her, even with his life. 

At last, a loud tone sounded through the cavern, signaling the end of the workday. Tommy carefully wrapped his tools, slipped them into a large pocket on his pants, and headed for the surface. The bright light burned his eyes as he stepped out into the sun. Running a hand through his hair, he walked towards the line for food, not noticing a crowd milling around. Tommy squinted. The workers were speaking in a variety of languages as they stood, a ripple of apprehension going through the bunch. Tommy considered trying to figure out what the occasion was, but surmising that it was a fight of some sort - those were common - he decided it wasn't worth it. 

"Attention!" came a call from up on a high guard tower where several soldiers stood gravely straight and a foreman lounged against the metal structure. Everyone stopped, no matter how hungry they were or how much they wanted to go back to their bunk and sleep. Lines began to form, and Tommy hurried to his place in the lines. Before anyone could be grabbed and singled out for punishment for being too slow, the lines were formed, everyone stood silent and waiting, all too tired or frightened to move.

Several of the soldiers came forward with a large wooden pole. Behind them came one of the foremen, dragging a woman. She was struggling against them, fighting tooth and nail to pull loose. While most captives fought for fear of the punishment they were about to receive, Tommy sensed that this woman was different. She fought, he realized, not to escape, but rather to deal her captor as many injuries as possible. Her dark skin glittered with beads of sweat in the bright light as the monster flung her hard against the pole and bound her to it, hands pulled high in the air. 

The woman stared defiantly at the crowd, as though to challenge them. _I'm not afraid of death,_ her eyes seemed to say to Tommy. _Why are you?_ Tommy felt a surge of blood flow up through his veins as he stared at her. _This woman is a warrior,_ he thought, furious at his own cowardice. 

The hiss of the whip sounded and left a glistening trail of blood where it stung across the woman's abdomen. As Tommy watched the blood ooze out, he gasped silently. The blood took on the quality of his dreams, and before he knew it, he was plunged into darkness.

_ The woman's skin had changed, this much he knew. She also wore a garment, the likes of which he had never seen before. He blinked. "Tommy?" she asked, concerned, "Are you all right?" "Oh, yes, of course. Sorry, didn't mean to space out like that." Laughter from others gathered around a table. "Aw, Tanya, he's just searching his mind for his lost memory!" More laughter, which he joined in._

~*~

"Zordon, what's going on?" asked Kimberly softly, both wanting to tear her eyes from the viewing globe and not being able to look away. It almost physically hurt her to see Tommy crumple to the ground like that. She tried not to even think about what Tanya was enduring. 

Billy stared. For once, he had no reassuring data, no schematics, nothing. He was at a complete loss to comprehend what had happened, for his whole mind and being screamed that it could not be so. He took a deep breath. From the moment Zordon's message had come across to Aquitar, he had figured on circumstances being bad. Remembering that he and the others, no matter what powers or team members, had overcome some amazingly difficult problems and come out the better for it, he maintained his hope. Until now.

Jason swallowed hard. _Retired, huh?_ he thought bitterly. _If only._ He knew well that it was plain, darn, simple luck that he'd needed to check in with Billy and the Aquitian scientists to ensure that the Gold Powers were completely purged from his body and that the after-effects were also abating. When Billy had been summoned from the room for 'an urgent message from Earth', Jason remembered feeling an icy ball form in his stomach, despite his rational sense being that all was well right now. After all, Terra Venture was in space protecting them, there were other rangers now that were more than competent, he reminded himself. However, when Billy returned, there was little to say before they were teleported back to their home. Back to the Power Chamber to face the most crushing news of their entire lives.

The old sage in his time warp looked away. He could not bring himself to face these, his first chosen. "The Earth has fallen."

"To whom?" exploded Kimberly, unable to keep herself in check any longer. _Came back to the Power Chamber to make sure Jason and Billy were all right on Aquitar, and before I know it, the whole darn place is shaking, and now we're being told that someone has taken over the earth? I am NOT hearing this!_ "Who did this? Why are we all safe in here? Why is Tommy," she faltered, as tears flooded her eyes, "fainting, and Tanya being hurt? Why, why, WHY!" she shouted the last.

Zordon looked even more ancient than his usual, his face more deeply lined even behind the glass of the warp tube. He looked down as Kimberly dissolved into deep, aching sobs, Billy and Jason seeming too shocked to move. For once, he had no answer.

_To be continued. Whether you loved it, hated it, or were somewhere in between, let me know what I can fix or am doing well on - reviews are appreciated greatly!!!_


	2. Decisions

**Prism**

_Disclaimer: Don't own 'em, don't make any money off 'em._

_Author's note: Thanks for the reviews! They really help me to write a better story, and they're encouraging. Thanks for pointing out my missing html tag that put the whole story in italics, I fixed that._

Jason could not bring himself to comprehend the enormity of what Zordon had just said, so he forced his numb mind onto another, more immediate situation: Kimberly's distress. "Kim," he began tentatively, and then stopped. He wanted to tell her "we'll figure something out," but as he thought about it, he realized that it was entirely possible that they couldn't. Suddenly finding himself helpless to say or do anything to help Kim, he turned to Zordon. "Are the Powers gone?"

"The Powers are never gone. They must always exist somewhere, somehow. When the Earth fell, however, the Powers you knew were nullified."

"In other words," murmured Billy bitterly, "we can't use them." Billy silently balled his hands into fists, feeling a more powerful fury than had ever possessed him run through his veins. Suddenly unable to restrain himself further, he lashed out suddenly, picking up a device resting on one of the consoles and flung it as hard as he could against the chamber wall where it shattered. "God DAMN it!" he shouted, his whole body trembling with rage and fear and the pain of losing. Tears ran down his cheeks, his jaw clenched. Whirling around wildly, he shouted at whomever was handy or would make a move to restrain him. "I am tired of being rational! I am tired of fighting! All of those years resisting…" Billy sank down against a console, gritting his teeth and then burying his face in his hands. "Oh, God…" It was almost a prayer issuing from the broken man.

Jason reached down and sank down beside his friend. Even in the most desperate of situations, he had rarely seen Billy crack. Somewhere in his mind, Jason felt exactly the same emotions, but at that instant, he could not bring them to the surface. It was as if he'd been neutered emotionally, unable to react, unable to think. He could not even bring himself to search out enough warmth to comfort his friends. 

"Is there anything we can do right now?" Jason inquired, unable to think of anything else to say. 

Zordon's silence was more telling than any answer he could have given. Slipping into a dispassionate leader mode, Jason looked over Kim's red, swollen, tearstained face and then at Billy, still slumped beside him. "If there's nothing to be done, then I suppose we'd better get some rest," he said, loathing his own weakness at needing such a thing. However, if there was any solution, it was not going to be found while they were in this state of mind. 

Standing up and walking toward the small living quarters the Power Chamber contained, the other two followed Jason like zombies. Billy without further ado fell onto the couch in the room and was asleep before his head hit the pillow. It was the move of a very defeated man, looking for oblivion wherever he could find it. Jason knew well that if Billy hadn't felt that the situation was hopeless, he would have been impossible to budge. 

Kimberly had lain down on the bed, and continued to cry, her sobs dry and racking her whole frame. The tears were spent, and all that remained was the ache that she couldn't purge even in exhaustion. 

Jason made sure that both teammates were situated before slipping into the small bathroom. Turning up the water as hot as it would go, he gasped at the physical pain of the small, driving, hot needles of water from the shower on his body. Forcing himself to bear it, at last tears came, more as a result of the physical pain of the scalding water than the mental anguish that plagued his heart and mind. It was enough, however. At last he was allowed the small comfort of being able to let the gasping sobs that had remained pent up since he had heard the news out.

~*~

A shrill laugh sounded through a sumptuously decorated palace. "Are you certain that they remember nothing?" 

"Yes, m'lady. They will perish as the slaves of that which they opposed so long."

"They were fools to underestimate me." Another laugh rang out, this one with a much more bitter tone to it. "Have you found all of them yet?"

"There are three left to confirm."

"Find them. There mustn't be any former Rangers that aren't identified and their location verified. I made many mistakes under that ridiculous spell placed on me. Idiots! Didn't anyone realize that no matter how well a spell is placed, the true character of the entity under the spell remains? It's his own fault that I was no longer the great strategist I once was. A general cannot be reduced to a mere soldier and not lose something in the process. I even forgot that simple principle of true character overwhelming a spell, or I might have been much more effective in my campaign. But he couldn't bear that I'd get the glory if I succeeded instead of him!" A soft round of murmured curses against the mysterious _him_ became audible. 

"Yes, m'lady."

"Now find the remaining three! And make sure that the others have _nothing_ that could remind them of their past as Rangers. Bad enough that idiot Goldar decided to call two of them by their former names. I will brook no excuses!"

"Indeed, mistress." 

~*~

Stealing into the barracks like a thief, Adam's eyes darted around making certain that he was indeed alone. He knew well that he was supposed to be outside witnessing what he assumed to be a punishment, but he was too far back in the lines to see the prisoner or what was being done to him/her. He was also far enough back that he had been able to slip off without being noticed. Silently, Adam pulled a small block out of the wall beside his bunk and took out the contents of the hole.

His sore fingers slipped over the soft leather binding. He recalled that the item had been called a 'book' at some point in his life, and he continued to think of it that way. Opening the front cover, he pored over the mysterious inscription that had given him his name, the only clue to his identity, written in a small neat hand: "To Adam, happy birthday, sweetie! Love, Tanya."

Adam. The name tasted familiar on his tongue, and it was what he called himself privately when no one else could hear. To do so felt like an act of rebellion, reclaiming something of the former life. _I think I liked the way I used to be,_ he mused in silence. Really, it seemed as though he'd been here in this society all of his life, working down in the cold, cavernous mines. The only thing that convinced him otherwise was the item he held in his hands that had obviously been part of his former life. Turning the pages of the book from where he'd left off the last time, marked with a small scrap of cloth, he began to read. It comforted him to read about the characters, though many of the descriptions confounded him. He simply could not comprehend some of the words the author had used.

Hearing a sounds of movement and then a shout from outside, Adam quickly hid the book again. He had no desire to lose it or have it taken away.

~*~

Kimberly awakened, her eyes swollen. Pulling herself up off the bed, she padded into the bathroom. "Ugh," she muttered aloud. The reflection that stared back at her from the mirror was quite unattractive, her face blotchy, red, and her eyes bloodshot. Forcing herself not to think, she showered and stepped out of the bathroom feeling mildly better. 

Slowly, as Kim gained complete consciousness of her surroundings, noting that both Jason and Billy were asleep in the small room, she sank silently to her knees, too spent even to cry out in the despair that blanketed her without warning.

Across the room, Jason opened his eyes, but remained lying on the bed. The leader, the Ranger in him was too stubborn to accept that earth was defeated. There had to be an answer. _The power always is,_ he thought, _and if that is true, then even defeat won't destroy it totally. At least, the power within us can't have been destroyed. Not even this can take away our free will to fight or die trying._ Tumbling out of the bed, Jason stood up and hurried over to Billy. 

"Wake up!" he shook the still-sleeping genius. "Wake up, Billy!"

"Go 'way."

Jason would not be deterred. "Get up!" he commanded. "Now!"

Billy grunted to himself. Whatever Jason was so hyped about, Billy didn't see why it couldn't wait. He saw no pressing urgency. _We're probably going to just die anyway. Can't I sleep a little, uninterrupted?_ Swatting Jason's hands away, he started to roll over away from Jason, both anguish and the crankiness from being rudely awakened making his normally alert brain a bit fuzzier than usual.

Being swatted provoked a definite response from Jason. Without further ado, he calmly, manually hauled Billy into a sitting position. "Unnngh…" groaned the startled scientist, finally starting to see through the fog in his brain. Realizing that Jason was right, and no matter how doomed they or their friends were, they had to at least _try_ to mount some resistance, Billy started to awaken. 

Kim, noting the commotion as well as Jason's sudden mania, had also come over. "Look, guys," said Jason seriously, "It doesn't matter whether or not we have powers. We've got to do what we can to help our friends."

Jason looked at the other two, deadly earnest. "We're probably going to die anyway. We have a choice - we can die in here, either from wasting away or when we're discovered, or we can try something. I'll be honest - this is more than likely a kamikaze sort of mission. But what else can we do?" His voice pleaded softly.

Billy nodded silently. "I'd rather die trying to resist than trapped in here." He spat the last part bitterly. "Like a rat in a hole. Might as well give them what fight we can."

Kimberly looked into both Jason's dark eyes and Billy's green ones, and then nodded decisively. "I'm in," she said and silently put her hand out in the long-running gesture they had coined when they'd first become Rangers. Two other hands joined hers.

"Power Rangers!"

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Like it? Hate it? Tell me! To Be Continued!


	3. Monochrome

**Prism**

_Disclaimer: I don't own them, never have, and barring some sort of miracle, never will._

_Thanks for the encouraging reviews! I really can tell you that they help! Sorry it's taken so long…I just moved back to school and what with all of that, I've been otherwise occupied._

Tommy stumbled inside to his barracks. Lying down on his bunk, he gasped deeply for air, filling his burning lungs. That had been close. Too close, he thought silently. He knew exactly how lucky he was that he hadn't been caught by one of the soldiers when he'd blacked out. The dream he'd had piqued at his consciousness, and he began to try to remember the muddle of unfamiliar sights and sounds he'd dreamed himself in. _Tanya. Tanya._ He repeated the name softly to himself, trying to see if it would bring any sort of memory to the surface. _Tanya…_

"Are you all right?" asked a softly accented voice above him, breaking into his train of thought. 

"Katherine." Tommy said the name feeling an odd sense of recognition flood him as he did so.

The pale girl looked down at him a slightly nonplussed expression crossing her face. "No, it's Kat," she said softly. "Who is Katherine?" 

Tommy tried to clear his head. "Sorry," he sighed. "I don't know, actually."

Kat smiled. "It's a pretty name," she said almost to herself. "I like it. If you want to call me Katherine, I don't mind."

Tommy nodded. "Katherine, then."

"I have to go. I just wanted to make sure you were all right."

"Thank you." Tommy watched her retreat. The gesture had touched him. Among the workers, he always felt terribly alone, and to have someone come to him in such a way was…rare. He lay back on the bunk, turned onto his side and finally wound up staring aimlessly at the bunk across from him. Suddenly, something caught his attention. 

Sitting up slowly, Tommy silently let his eyes dart around the room, and when he had ascertained that he had reasonable privacy and that the owner of the bunk didn't seem to be around, he stole over. His fingers scrabbled slightly along the wall. _I could have sworn that I saw something sticking out just a little, _he thought. However, as minutes wore on and he found nothing amiss, he was about to give up when his finger caught. Within seconds, he had pried the loose piece out of the wall. 

Behind the wall lay a tiny nook. Inside the nook was an item Tommy didn't really recall, but that he could identify as having been in his dreams. Giving one more surreptitious glance around, he carefully took it out. 

Very slowly, Tommy opened the cover. On the inside, he read the inscription: "To Adam, happy birthday, sweetie! Love, Tanya." _Tanya!_ he thought jubilantly at the name from his dream, but his thoughts were interrupted when he noticed one of the men who had been milling around with a couple of the others in the barrack heading in his direction. Lightning quick, Tommy replaced the item and the wall. Going back to his bunk, his thoughts swirled. He knew, at least, he had to figure out who the person was that would hide an item obviously forbidden. _Perhaps,_ he thought, _there is a possibility…_

~*~

Adam swung the heavy sledgehammer at the rock face. It felt wonderful to do some work that wasn't quite as delicate as prying crystals whole and undamaged out of the mine, and his blow was strong. Sparks from the metal of the hammer striking the rock lit up the cavern for an instant, and then a large sheet of rock fell away. This sort of labor also had the distinct advantage of allowing Adam to work semi-mindlessly and think about other things than his task. At the moment, he was trying to remember if he'd put the block in the wall back seamlessly. It had been a quick job, fearful he'd be caught and also knowing that he was soon going to have to report for his shift in the mines - not wanting to be late for that - had both motivated speed over quality. _Too late, really, to be worrying so,_ thought Adam. The only thing to be done was to hope the piece had been replaced well enough to escape detection for the time being and checking it when his shift finished.

"Ow!" The sudden exclamation startled Adam mildly. Few workers ever said anything out loud - not even sudden exclamations of pain, most having been cowed into a sullen silence long ago. The young man who the expostulation issued from was standing looking at a nasty gash in his arm where his chisel must have slipped. He appeared to be about Adam's age, of a muscular build and a shorter haircut. Dark eyes caught Adam's. Smiling slightly, the young man flashed Adam what passed for a friendly look. "Idiot chisels," he remarked calmly, heedless of the surprised looks radiating from the other workers, who were both amazed at his bravery in speaking, thus drawing attention to himself, and also his joviality.

Adam wasn't sure exactly what to say. Giving the young man a sympathetic look, he went back to swinging the sledgehammer at the wall. For some reason, the whole thing disturbed Adam. Yet at the same time, he was utterly unable to put his finger on the reason why. Filing away the thought, he devoted his entire attention to his work. Seeing the gash on the man's arm had sobered him, and he knew he couldn't afford to make mistakes. There was no access to medical aid. 

~*~

Brushing her long hair out of her face, the small, willowy girl silently stole into the darkness of the prison cells. She was responsible for bringing food to the prisoners, but in addition, her conscience dictated that she attempt to help those incarcerated there, some of them badly injured. She refused to worry about the consequences. It was a decision she'd made when she knew she wanted to help somehow - while she did have an instinct for survival, the idea of allowing suffering when she had even the smallest opportunity to help was abhorrent to her.

She worked in the kitchens that served the workers; she had been selected for this particular duty due to her small size. Much stronger than she looked, however; she had grown used to handling heavy pots and bags of food. Regrettably, she thought, it was unfortunate that they weren't heavier. No one really had enough to eat, especially not the kitchen workers, who got served last. She knew of people who stole bits of food as they worked, but she never felt right about doing so, even when she was hungry. She felt that the miners needed it more, even though life in the kitchen was not easy. The other day, one woman had been terribly scalded by a pot of boiling water tipping onto her. She secretly suspected the woman to be dead by now. 

Her fellow workers in the kitchen tended to call her 'Trini', a seemingly nonsense syllable someone had coined from a tag she'd been wearing when the events that led up to the present had been set in motion, she supposed. The name suited her fine, though she vaguely remembered other names being associated with herself. Putting her mind back on her present task, she was grateful that Bear, the young woman who worked beside her in the kitchen, had let her take the food this evening. Bear knew what Trini did, in trying to help the prisoners, and often, if there had been someone punished, would find an excuse to send Trini to the prison. Actually, reflected Trini, often, when she'd reach her destination, she would discover some precious strips of cloth for bandages or extra water for washing wounds clean under the top that covered the food. Trini suspected that Bear of giving the items, and knew that if she herself were caught, Bear would likely also be implicated. It always sobered her and made her doubly cautious, but it boosted her morale to know that she wasn't alone. 

Opening the door, Trini gestured to her tray to show the guards her intent. With a few lewd and ugly comments that Trini saw fit to ignore, they allowed her to pass. The metal door clanged shut behind her, and Trini entered the first cell. First, handing the food to the older male prisoner in it, she then carefully glanced around and spoke in a low voice. "Show me that laceration from the other day." 

The man acquiesced, and Trini was pleased to note that it was healing nicely. When she first saw the wound, she had feared that he'd get one of the rampant infections, but now she knew he was out of danger. Looking at her tray, she was pleased to note that the cloth strips and extra water were there. Rarely did she get both for one trip, but after the punishment of the young woman earlier in the day, she suspected she'd need both badly. 

Continuing on, Trini silently distributed meals and whatever care she could, working to conserve as many of her bandages and water as she could for the girl who had been whipped. At last, she came to the final cell. "Hello?" she whispered cautiously. 

Her only answer was a moan from the corner. Setting the tray down, Trini took her bandages and water to the girl. Probing the wounds lightly in the dim light, Trini could tell they were deep. One in particular was especially bad, and Trini sighed to herself, wishing she had more at her disposal. Handing a folded strip to the girl, Trini steeled herself. "Bite down on this if you have to," she hissed, "but don't cry out. This is going to hurt."

She watched as the girl's face set defiantly, and then began to work at sluicing water through the wounds and removing any visible impurities. Twice, Trini found herself unsure how the girl wasn't screaming in pain. At last, Trini began to bandage the wounds, packing the one deep wound full of cloth to put pressure in it and help quell the bleeding. Finally, she carefully tore a few pieces off the girl's garment, and disguised her work. "Don't let them catch you with these," she whispered. "If you have to, rub some of the dirt onto them. If the guards realize the cloth is fresh, they'll wonder where you got it, and we'll all be in trouble." Trini knew that every time she put bandages on a prisoner, she ran the risk of discovery, but she refused to do otherwise. So far, her trust had been rewarded, and she somehow knew that this girl wouldn't break it. Gathering up her materials and covering the tray, she walked out of the cell and back toward the kitchen.

~*~

Billy was in the process of running a number of scans, but until they finished, there was little any of the three could do. At the minute, Billy was trying to determine why the powers had failed, what kind of force had been used to take over the earth, and how damaged or disabled the Power Chamber's equipment was. However, at the moment, there was nothing to do but wait. Yawning, he sighed irritably. _I need a walk,_he thought, _and scans indicate no sign of activity near here. I wonder if I stay right by the door, I could go outside for just a few minutes. Take in this new world._ Looking up at Zordon, he voiced the question aloud. 

Zordon had grave reservations, but Billy was determined. Crankiness and the want to control just one thing, even if it was as simple as going outside made him stubborn, and at last, Zordon gave him a hesitant affirmative on the condition that Billy strayed no further than 20 feet from the door. Satisfied, Billy headed for the surface. It wouldn't make much of a walk, but at least he'd won the argument, and that gave him some satisfaction. 

Opening the door, Billy was lost in thought about theories as to what might have destroyed the powers so suddenly and effectively. Suddenly, he gasped. Blinking hard, he wondered if it were a trick of the light. After a few minutes of stunned silence, Billy ran back down the stairs, yelling for Kim and Jason. 

"What is it, bro?" he heard Jason answer.

"Come up here! You've got to see this, you'll never believe me or your eyes!" came Billy's breathless reply. Shortly, Kim and Jason had joined him. Together, they all stepped out the door.

"Ohmigosh!" gasped Kim. "This isn't possible. It's not!"

Jason just stared. "Dorothy," he muttered, "I think we just went back to Kansas." Like the scenes set in Kansas in "The Wizard of Oz", there was not a dash of color to be found. The entire world had become black and white with shades of gray in between, the landscape a terrible monochrome.

"It's amazing," Billy babbled, "Now I know why the powers won't work. The powers are linked to color."

_To be continued…_


	4. The Archives

**Prism**

_A/N: First things first: I don't own them, and I'm not making any money off this. That being said, sorry it's taken me so long to work on this chapter - scientific/technical/background explanations are not my favorite part of writing. Hope you enjoy!_

Racing back down the stairs into the Power Chamber, Billy Cranston looked like a child on Christmas morning. Seizing on one explanation that he could at last use to justify the strange situation, he barely gave a convoluted, technical response in explanation for his strange mania to Alpha and Zordon before immediately setting to work. Both the robot and the interdimensional being were considering Billy's words when Kim and Jason entered the room. 

"What has happened?" Zordon inquired, deciding not to bother trying to figure out Billy's explanation and to rely on the others to provide him with the necessary details. Both Kimberly and Jason looked slightly dazed. They exchanged glances before beginning. It was hard enough believing it with their eyes, and to verbalize it was for a moment beyond them. Finally Jason spoke.

"There's no color." The statement was simple and rang through the chamber, which was quiet except for Billy's incomprehensible soft mutterings and his fiddling with the consoles. Zordon considered in silence. 

Jason stood waiting respectfully for Zordon to speak. For once, his mentor seemed at a momentary loss, and that, as much as the strange landscape and the terrible knowledge that Earth was no longer sovereign, bothered Jason slightly. Zordon had always been so knowledgeable, so capable and resolute no matter how bad the situation was that to witness even this small display of weakness felt dismaying and disorienting to Jason. However, at last Zordon broke the silence. "Before, I have always been able to guide you and give you information based on past occurrences and general knowledge of the enemy we faced. I will be honest, I have only heard of - and that an ancient legend - such a situation as this once."

"What is the legend or story?" inquired Kimberly, gazing intently at her mentor. 

Zordon sighed. "The legend speaks of a woman, a great military strategist and enchantress who had conquered many planets and systems, but at last encountered significant resistance on one small planet utilizing a color-based power system. Finding a rift in the space-time continuum, she found a way to maneuver the planet into the rift. As a result of the changes that occurred when the planet moved into another dimension, there were several noteworthy ones: the manipulation of time became possible for her, as did the manipulation of color on the planet."

Jason held up a hand suddenly. "Then why do we have color in here?" he asked. "I mean, providing that this is the same sort of a phenomenon, which we don't know for sure yet, but wouldn't screwing up the colors include here?"

"Not necessarily," answered Zordon. "The elimination of color is more of an illusion than anything else. For example, when you look at a prism in a diffused light, it has no color; it only seems clear or maybe a little whitish. However, when you shine a direct light on it, the nature of the object makes it refract the light and you see rainbows. It's all a matter of the type of light and how you look at it whether or not you see color. To eliminate the color, whoever it is - assuming the same principle of the space-time rift of course - used some sort of illusory tactic. This means that whoever could only use it on lands and buildings that are known. We are standing in an oversight and therefore, unknown. In other words," he said, noting the blank stares on both Kimberly and Jason's faces, "they are seeing the proverbial prism in the diffused light, and we are seeing the refracted beams. They see only the clear glass; we see the colors produced within it. We are standing in 'direct' light and outside, it's all diffused."

Kimberly wasn't entirely sure that she was satisfied, but deciding that she had the basic concept, was about to ask Zordon about the fate of the planet in the legend, but was cut off before she could open her mouth by Billy.

"Then why won't the colors work?" he said, a puzzled expression gracing his features. "If it's an illusory tactic, then colors still exist, they just can't be seen. What's stopping us from simply appearing grey to those who can't see the colors in our suits? Couldn't we morph in here where there is color?"

Zordon had a ready answer. "For some reason, the powers are automatically included in the illusion. When the bearer invokes them, the powers immediately try to tie to color. However, because of the illusion, the powers are "blind" to the color - similarly to the people out there who don't recognize it right now - and since they can't…I am not sure how to verbalize this…sense it, I suppose would be the closest approximation, they don't fuse with it. And since all of our powers are color-based, when the power can't fuse with the color, they are nullified. As for your question about morphing in here, the color of the powers aren't linked to the Power Chamber in that sense, but rather to the colors of the earth at large. "

"Oh." Said Billy, carefully digesting the information.

"The powers are unable to find the color they need to fuse with?" inquired Jason, making certain that he'd interpreted the explanation correctly.

"That is what I said. To the best of my knowledge, unless the effect can be undone, they are useless."

Jason nodded. "How would we go about reversing this?" 

"Hang on," said Kim, a determined frown creasing her pretty face, "I want to know in detail the struggle of this planet. What happened to it?"

Zordon looked away briefly. "It was destroyed," he said softly. 

Hearing Kimberly's words about the details of the struggle suddenly gave Jason's mind a kick-start. As he opened his mouth, Billy, not seeing Jason about to speak, cut him off inadvertently. "Are there any written legends of this? Data? Anything?"

Jason nodded, backing his friend. "Exactly. If we're going up against anything that's similar, we've got to find out all we can about this 'Prism Effect' and how to reverse it."

Zordon, in that instant, felt a surge of pride come over him. In his many thousands of years, he had rarely found a group this committed and determined to succeed or die trying. _All from my first-chosen in this millennia_ he thought warmly. "If you are looking for such information, I would advise you to look in the Archives, deep under this chamber for references to the planet Orotron. Alpha will lead you. At the door to the Archives, you will find a small shelf. On it will be several small devices. These are for translating any of the languages in the books to English instantly. Good luck, Kimberly, Jason, Billy." He lingered on each name slowly, thinking about each young man or woman in turn. How they had grown! From a terrified, introverted boy, a seemingly shallow, vapid girl, and a young man with all the potential for great leadership but none of the opportunity, he now saw the trio of warriors that came forged out of the fires of all the trials throughout their years. _I took away their innocence,_ he thought regretfully, _I took so much of them. But instead of mourning their losses, they've risen into the greatest and most determined warriors Earth has ever seen._ Yet though he knew he'd done what he must, it pained him deeply to know that he would soon send them out, probably to their deaths. Even the warrior spirit within him that thought only of ends, not means ached at that knowledge.

~*~

"Ay-yi-yi," exclaimed Alpha, leading the three down a small, dusty, obviously rarely used passage. The robot gave a metallic approximation of a sneeze, and Billy and Kim exchanged looks of amusement at the noise. 

"Bless you," said Jason, catching the eye of the other two, all three barely containing laughter. 

"Thank you," said Alpha. "Ah, here it is!" He stopped in front of a metal door, pressed a few buttons, and the door slid open. Inside an enormous stone vault with a high decorative ceiling, laid quite literally thousands of volumes. The lighting in the vault had an odd, yellowish cast. The mosaics that decorated the ceiling were missing tiles here and there, and everything was covered in a thick layer of cobweb and dust. Nonetheless, it was obvious that the vault had once been a magnificent and pleasant library.

"Wow," breathed Billy softly. "I've always known this was down here, but I've never gone in. Impressive."

Jason nodded, too awed to say anything. Alpha shuffled around, handing each of them one of the translators that Zordon had told them about. "Place the scope over the part of the page you wish to read and the translation will appear in the viewer, here." He pointed to a small screen on each of the small devices. "Good luck," he said and began the long walk back up to the main chamber. 

Kim let out an audible groan. "There are hundreds of books in here," she sighed. "How are we ever going to find the right ones?"

Billy, observant and curious as ever, was poking around. "Look!" he exclaimed, pulling out a dusty drawer from what appeared to be a wall. "I think it's a card catalogue." The drawer contained pieces of yellowed paper organized in a neat row.

Jason looked at the massive bank that he suddenly realized contained many, many drawers and allowed himself one inner grumble of protest. "Okay, guys," he said aloud, slipping into leader mode, "If this is organized anything like a real card catalogue, Kim, start looking for a drawer about Orotron. Billy, why don't you look for references to color-related spells and time rifts. I'll start looking up military references. If you find anything, pull out the card and then we'll all come down in a little while and compare notes." Bravely, Jason started for the drawer nearest him. Wiping the grime off the inscription that indicated contents, Jason began searching.

It took hours. Finding promising drawers alone was difficult, and once they had finished searching the drawers that were at their height, all were obliged to climb up on ladders they found whose use appeared to be for looking at the upper drawers. By the time each had accumulated a few precious cards, they were completely filthy from the dust, tired, Kimberly had accidentally caught her thumb in a drawer and cut it badly, Billy had taken a tumble off an unsteady ladder, and Jason had managed to crack his head on an upper drawer that had been inadvertently left open. Nursing their wounds, they sat down at a large wooden table to view their progress. Billy set five cards on the table. "Here's what I have," he sighed. "I'm not sure even how relevant to our situation they are, but it took me long enough to find them."

Kim set out three. "I found a couple of others with very small references," she said, "but I fastened a couple of pieces of cloth on the drawers, so if we need them, they'll be easy to find." Her pink shirt missed several pieces of fabric around the sleeves. "These were the best, though."

Jason added six more cards to the stack. "Some of these won't do us much good," he admitted. "At least, I don't think so. But it's something, so they're worth checking."

All of them stared at the fourteen decrepit pieces of paper that represented the last five hours' work. "If I ever get back here," vowed Billy, "I'm going to figure out a way to catalogue all these volumes on one of the computers. That way, they're more accessible."

"Amen," groaned Jason. Glancing around at his two cohorts, he sighed. "Let's find those books."

Finding the books proved not to be nearly as difficult as they had anticipated. The shelves were surprisingly well organized and easily identified. After only an hour, fourteen books lay on the table. Munching on some food that Alpha had brought, the three were busily embroiled in scanning the books for references to the legend as quickly as possible. Jason began to become conscious of the fact that he was beginning to grow tired, and wondered how Billy and Kimberly were holding up. His fears that they would begin fading were quickly realized as he studied their streaky, dirty faces. Forcing his eyes down the page, Jason continued reading until something interesting caught his eye, banishing his fatigue. "Billy! Kim! Look at this."

~*~

"Where are they?" snapped a voice full of impatience. "I thought you said that you'd run scans to locate them."

"I did, m'lady. They have not been found."

"So. You have merely missed three major threats to us. Are you certain that the one is not still on Aquitar?"

"Yes m'lady. Data indicates that he left the planet."

"Call Goldar to me. Meddling little toady, but perhaps he'll do better than you."

"Yes, m'lady." A pause resulted while the soldier did so. Then, the silken swish of a blade cutting the air and metal ringing sounded. Through the door came a woman, of medium height but an imposing countenance. 

"Clean that up," she hissed at the guard by the door. "I want nothing to do with it."

~*~

Adam groaned softly. Never so glad as now that his shift was over, he exhaustedly dragged himself back towards his bed. That his secret hiding place for his forbidden item would be discovered had nagged in the back of his mind the entire time, making him even more eager to go back and make sure that all was well. Entering the barracks, he hurried towards his bunk. Reaching it, he surreptitiously examined the wall visually. Something seemed slightly amiss…not the way he'd left it. Only then did he become aware of a long-haired youth standing behind him. Turning, Adam faced the young man, staring fiercely. He knew if it came down to a confrontation, any show of weakness would be fatal to his cause, and while his insides quaked, his gaze was steady. 

Not giving away anything since he didn't know if this was the one who had discovered the hollow in the wall or just someone looking for a fight, Adam took a deep breath and waited for the other to state his business. At last, the young man spoke, his voice very low. "I know about what you're hiding."

Adam felt his heart leap into his throat, but kept his face impassive. "And?" he tossed back with a nonchalance he didn't feel.

"I want to help you."

_To Be Continued…_


	5. Revealed

****

Prism

_Sorry about the length of time between updates! Thanks for being so patient._

Disclaimer: see previous chapters. The short version: they aren't mine!

Adam exhaled slowly, continuing to regard the young man with extreme wariness. "What's your name?" he inquired finally.

"They call me Tommy. Yours?"

Adam still didn't completely trust him, and found himself unwilling to volunteer the information. Instead he covered with another question. "Why?" Genuinely curious, Adam studied Tommy's expression. He knew if Tommy told the soldiers or one of the foremen about the discovery, Tommy would likely receive a reward. That the tall youth hadn't done so tempted Adam to trust him, but an inner core of reticence wouldn't let it happen just yet.

Tommy's face clouded and Adam had the strange feeling of being evaluated for something. Finally, Tommy glanced around surreptitiously. The two men both had reputations as loners, and the few others that were in the barracks were ignoring them entirely, most of them engrossed in some sort of a game using chips of rock in varying sizes as counters. Finally, he spoke. "I can't live like this any more. Not under the control of this so-called Empress."

Adam raised his eyebrows. There were many, he was certain, that despised the Empress, but almost none that would face the penalty of death by torture by voicing their opinions aloud. Especially not to what amounted to an almost perfect stranger. Caught up in his musing, he barely noticed his companion's eyes hardening.

Tommy observed a look of doubt cross the youth's face. A small bubble of apprehension rose in his chest. Perhaps he had been too hasty in revealing his purpose, but Tommy was a man of action and little suited to mincing words or dancing around the issue. In a burst of fear, Tommy spoke again, his voice dropping even lower than previously. "You couldn't tell anyone I what I said even if you wanted to," he hissed. "I know your secret, and if you choose to try to expose me, I'll just reveal what you've been hiding and claim that you're lying. And they'll believe me because I have hard evidence."

Adam took a step backward, and then, reconsidering, went against every internal warning and stepped up to challenge the other. "Oh?" he sneered, covering his fear with a veneer of anger, "Really? Are you so sure about that? I could simply claim the book is yours and you planted it."

Surprisingly, Tommy took a step backward. Instinctively, he knew he'd pressed far too hard. "Is that what it's called? A book?" The honest curiosity in Tommy's question took Adam entirely off guard, tearing down Adam's defenses in those few words. 

Still unwilling to completely trust, Adam continued to challenge Tommy, standing deliberately, uncomfortably close. Finally, he came to an abrupt decision. With Tommy knowing his secret, he had to trust him at least somewhat. "Yes, it's called a book. They", he motioned to the general population of the barracks, "call me Parker. I call myself Adam."

Tommy nodded. "May I call you that? Adam, I mean."

Adam gave a motion of assent. "Listen," he muttered. "We better quit talking before someone gets suspicious and reports us for the pittance they'll get for doing so. When is your next shift?"

"Tonight at fourth watch."

"So is mine. Meet me by the Do'an entrance during the shift change. The soldiers and foremen will be busy counting the workers coming in."

~*~

"What is it, Jason?" asked Kim, eagerly abandoning her book. Her head ached, and it felt wonderful simply to stand up and walk over to where the former Red and Gold ranger sat.

Billy joined them silently. Jason glanced at the other two, then flipped the page of his book, drawing twin gasps from Billy and Kim. "No." said Kim flatly. "That's just impossible."

Billy shook his head. "I'd concur, but I think we ought to consult Zordon."

Jason hefted the book up, and groaned as his cramping legs protested his sudden attempt to use them. He glanced over at Billy. The genius was clearly absorbed in thought, and Jason decided against speaking to him. Making their way to the main chamber slowly, they finally climbed the last set of stairs and blinked against the brighter lights of the room.

"Ai-yi-yi!" cried Alpha at their disheveled, dusty appearance. Billy's normally blonde hair was now a soft grey, and Kim's had white highlights, plus a dust streak on her cheek. 

"Where's Zordon?" asked Billy unceremoniously, noticing the warp tube was empty. 

Almost immediately, Zordon appeared. "What is it, Rangers?" he asked gravely.

"We found this." Jason held up the book, open to the picture. "It looks like Rita Repulsa." The picture actually showed a woman quite a bit younger and prettier than the adversary the rangers had faced, but the features were unmistakeable.

The ancient mentor closed his eyes briefly. "I have feared this day since Master Vile and Lord Zedd conspired to enslave her."

"Whoa!" cried Kimberly. "What are you talking about? Rita enslaved?"

Zordon heaved a gusty sigh. "I think you had better hear the whole story."

Billy bit his lip. "No kidding," he muttered sarcastically to himself. It was the only outlet for his pure frustration and rage. _Why does Zordon never tell us anything up front?_ He mused. He found himself unable to control his thoughts as they spun around. _Zordon never told us Lord Zedd existed until he showed up on our doorstep and wreaked havoc we were entirely unprepared for. Dumb luck that we were able to wrest the zords out of his control that first time and that when they were destroyed, Alpha managed to rescue enough components to create the new ones. Then the entire Ivan Ooze disaster. None of us knew of Ivan's existence, but Zordon did. Damn it, Alpha and I were even working to modify Command Center security only a week previous to Ivan's release. If Zordon had told us about Ivan's existence, we could have worked on securing the Command Center against a creature like Ivan. But no! And of course, how can I forget the Machine Empire? Why didn't Zordon tell us about them – I know from my research that they began building their empire centuries ago. Zordon ought to have warned us about threats like them before they came so we could prepare for the advent of their onslaught! Now one of them has conquered the world we worked so hard to defend! Would it have been so hard to warn us that Rita was more than she seemed? NO!_ Struggling, the former Blue Ranger curbed his feelings. This was not the time. 

"Born almost 57,000 years ago on a planet called Ter, Rita showed herself a specially gifted child. Most beings who harness the Power – the vast force from which you all derived your powers – must use objects such as the ones you are familiar with: morphers, power coins, and crystals. For them, it is an outside force they may assume given enough strength and the right attributes. However, on rare occasions, one is born with an immense amount of sheer innate power that the being can use without the aid of mechanical devices and can never give up or lose. In addition, the sheer volume of the innate power is so great that often these beings can even bestow enough power upon devices like power coins to create their own rangers. There is no discrimination among races – it is certainly possible that a human could be born one. Billy and Kimberly, you met one of these exceptional beings once: Dulcea of Phaedos."

"Master Warriors?" asked Jason, having heard a number of stories about Dulcea, particularly about her knocking Tommy flat on his butt. He knew, all the good-natured ribbing the rangers had given Tommy aside, she was no one to be trifled with. 

"That is one form a being such as that may take. In addition, some become Morphin' Masters and sit on the council, others create and mentor their own teams. Collectively, they are known as the Lei'risins - it's an Eltarian term that means "Long Lived", but also venerates their great powers."

"Are you one of those?" asked Kim. 

If it were possible for a projection to blush, Zordon would have. "Yes," he confessed. "Rita was born almost three millennia after me. Only one other Lei'risin was born in the interim."

"Oh."

"Rita's father Celithein – or Master Vile as you know him – was a great intellectual, highly respected, who bore ranger powers and was in close contact with the Morphin' Council. For many years, he served faithfully."

Jason, Billy and Kim waited. Zordon, for some reason, seemed reluctant to continue.

"The power Celithein bore had an odd effect upon his genetic structure. While he did not achieve an internalization of the power, it greatly extended his life-span to be comparable to the millenniums-long span of a Lei'risin. However, before any knew of this effect, Celithein married a lovely girl named Elina. They lived quite happily for years, bearing one child they were overjoyed to discover had Lei'risin powers, until the couple noticed that while Elina aged, Celithein remained the same. Celithein ran tests on himself and discovered the mutation."

"Celithein was beside himself at the idea of living so long without his beloved Elina. He put before the Council a petition to infuse her with specialized powers he had begun creating to keep her alive. I sat on the Council at that time. All of us loved Elina greatly, and none wanted to see her die, but what Celithein requested was an abuse of the powers we had. I have admonished you never to use the power for personal gain, and when the matter came before the Council, we abided by the stricture. Keeping Elina alive was clearly using the power for personal gain." Zordon's voice quavered ever so slightly, causing the trio before him to surreptitiously exchange looks. 

Rushing on, Zordon appeared to be attempting to blunt his emotions. "We voted, all of us heavy-hearted. When we denied Celithein's petition, he turned and walked out of the Council chambers without so much as a look back. He abandoned his quarters, housed in the same compound as the Council, taking his wife and child. We did not hear of him again for many years."

"When Celithein left, Rita was still quite young. Celithein's anger against the Morphin' Council grew as he dwelt, and he began working to pervert his daughter's character. He wished for revenge upon the Council he perceived as having 'murdered', in his words, his wife. His daughter's Lei'risin powers were his only chance, because for all his intelligence, he knew he could not defeat the Council and their Master Warriors, Mentors, and Ranger teams. With Rita and her powers, though, he possessed a powerful weapon. He taught her all he could about weapons and nurtured her intellectual genius."

"Rita was a genius?" Kim asked doubtfully. Pictures of the bumbling sorceress shrieking after her inept attempts on the Rangers filled the girl's mind. 

"Indeed, one of amazing mental capacity. She also excelled in weapons training and hand-to-hand combat. However, her main resource was her incredible gifting in military strategy. Celithein taught her to hate the Council and all it stood for with a passion. By this time, he was no longer Celithein, but called himself Master Vile."

"Rita began to show her might across the galaxy, conquering several planets in a very short time. Her mastery of spells and manipulation of dimensions and time were renowned. It does not surprise me to find she is the one who captured Orotron. I did not know it was her until now, but her quick finding of the weakness in the Rangers there is a testimony to her intelligence and strength."

"Vile became jealous of his daughter's power. He knew he could not control her. So he entered into an alliance with the only Lei'risin born between myself and Rita: a young man from the dark planet Zaniar. The forces of evil had conquered Zaniar long ago, and the Lei'risin grew up fighting for his very survival. Unfortunately, he learned many dark arts including sorcery during that time, and he became as evil a being as existed, eventually defeating the initial conqueror of Zarian to replace that evil lord with himself. He had gained a taste for blood during his fighting days, and inflicted horrific acts upon the people of Zarian, and began to extend his rule to other planets he conquered mercilessly, inflicting maximum casualties. Joined with a rogue Gold ranger as his foot-servant, Vile recognized the Zarian's potential. I do not think I have to tell you that the Zarianan was none other than Lord Zedd, and his servant, Goldar."

"Vile promised if Zedd would use sorcery to grant him great powers, he would allow Zedd to take control of his daughter and her powers. The only other thing Vile wanted out of the bargain was Zedd's oath that he would do all in his power to bring the downfall of the Morphin' Council. Zedd, already vengeful against the Council for not acknowledging his as the rightful leadership of Zarian, agreed readily. Infusing Vile with great powers, he and Vile then proceeded to craft a spell to enslave Rita."

"To make her subject to them, Vile and Zedd were forced to blunt Rita's keen intelligence. She became no more than the flunky you knew her as. And yet, she was still extremely dangerous even in her enspelled state. Only 10,000 years ago were I, Dulcea, and a team of young rangers able to capture her. For more than 40,000 years after the spell was placed on her, she remained undefeated."

"She eventually escaped and found the Earth. There, she created the Green Power Coin from her Lei'risin powers, and subjected Tommy to the same spell she herself lived under. She had forgotten that in casting spells, eventually, the true character of the entity under the spell will break through. Tommy is a noble youth, and thus, we were able to break the spell on him because the spell went against his true character."

"So how did Rita suddenly break the spell on herself? Why didn't she do it sooner?" asked Jason.

"I assume," said Zordon, "that either Zedd or Vile has been destroyed. In eliminating one of the original casters, it would weaken the spell enough to allow Rita's true character to break through and for her to recognize its presence. Once alerted to it, she could quickly finish the rest. The reason she did not break it before this is because it would have taken an outside source to undo it. None, save for Vile and Zedd, could ever have gotten close enough to give the necessary antidote. They certainly weren't going to undo their own spell, and all of us on the Council decided against undoing it because that would have given Rita more power. She already gave us enough of a challenge without being fully powered."

"I can't believe Master Vile had a wife," muttered Kim, her exhausted mind dwelling on the trivial.

"Well, he did," said Zordon.

"Did Rita ever know her mother?" Asked Jason suddenly. "I'm sure Elina would have wished her to be a force for good."

"Elina was a woman of great character. She would have been furious to see what happened to her daughter and husband over her death."

"You knew her well, then?" said Billy.

Zordon averted his eyes from them. "She was my daughter."

__

To Be Continued


	6. Chances

****

Prism

__

Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. I don't know who they belong to, but please don't sue me. If you do, your net gain will be an ancient copy of Wheelock's Latin, some novels for my 20th Century Fiction course, an enormous anthology of American Literature, and a couple of books on the American political system. Believe me, it's not worth it!

Author's note: Well, in penance for my delay, I've written a chapter twice as long as the others so far. I kept meaning to post a chapter within a week. However, good intentions pave the road to Hell, so here I am nearly three months later just getting something done, courtesy of finals, credit overloads, transfer applications, midterms and other general things that seem to get in the way. I'm finally back though, and planning to update my other stories as well as this one in the next week or two! Thanks for your patience and support! Y'all are awesome, especially Dagmar, Symbolic Agony and Lilac Moon, plus so many others!

  


She struggled to sit up. "Ohhhh…" A soft moan escaped her lips, then she pursed them hard. _I do not cry out for them,_ she reminded herself stubbornly, seeing a shadow flit across the wall that reminded her of her captors. Gritting her teeth, she slowly detached her back from the stone of the bench in the cell. Her damp, broken skin stuck to the surface, and by the time she had peeled herself off it, she couldn't stop a tear from running down her face. A soft knock startled her.

Two figures entered the cell, bearing a tray. "Is it time to eat again already?" she couldn't resist asking. It was rare to get this much food. She supposed it was because here in the prison, the food, while in scant portions, was actually handed to her and without other people in the cell, there wasn't the problem with having to fight for her share. 

The smaller girl bent silently, expert hands checking the bandages, unwrapping them where she could see seepage.

"Who are you?"

The girl looked up slightly suspiciously. She'd helped this prisoner before, but never given any sort of personal details. Examining the face before her, she finally seemed to decide that there was no threat. "They call me Trini." 

"Tay." 

Trini looked back to the lash marks on Tay's back. They were beginning to heal a bit, but Trini had to admit that she was concerned about a small bit of infection starting in one deeper cut. _Whatever I do, I have to clean that out before it spreads_. She looked to the third woman, still standing with the tray. "Bear, take a look at this," she murmured. 

The woman came over, and probed the wound gently. "It's infected," she sighed. Silently looking down at Tay, she shook her head slightly as an odd flash of recognition went through her, but the moment was fleeting and she turned back to brisk efficiency. "We have to clean this out," she said with a grimace. It would hurt terribly, Bear knew. To curtail the spread, they were going to have to clean hard, and quite possibly even pull some of the necrotic and infected skin off entirely. Yet, it was better than having Tay die from the infection. Bear set the tray down. Uncovering it, she thought about giving Tay some of the food, but decided against it until after she and Trini had worked on the wounds. She'd seen people vomit because of the pain, and with so precious little food, there was no sense in wasting it like that. 

Trini was digging around in her shapeless garment. At last she produced a slender metal object. Bear recognized it immediately. How Trini had gotten her hands on a blade of any kind was a mystery, but it would aid them in cutting the cloth for bandages, and if it came to that, the infection out. 

Trini's skilled fingers rested on the unbroken flesh around the infected wound. An unnatural heat emanated from it, and Trini slowly applied pressure, her fingers creeping closer and closer to the edge of the wound. A thick pus emerged, as did an awful smell. Putting her hand out, Trini felt the blade placed in it. _It's not sharp enough_ she thought. Shaking her head, she concentrated only on the raw surface before her eyes, refusing to think of it as a part of a living person. Out of the corner of her eye, she observed Bear all but gagging the girl and placing a strong hand over the girl's mouth. She forced the image out of her mind, as well as the girl's name - easier that way. Pressing her one hand hard just above the area Trini had chosen for her first incision to keep it taut, she thrust the knife through the tissue. 

"Gah!" came a gasp. Bear's face bore a resolution somehow unnatural in one as young as she was – Trini surmised Bear to be close to her own age. Bear held the girl tightly, unwilling to let her move. 

Once partially cut, the infected skin came loose and Trini excised it. The next part, she knew, would be the most painful and difficult, and she found herself praying that her patient lost consciousness soon. Now that she could see how far the infection had gone, Trini plunged the blade in again, this time into healthy skin just above the infection. Unimaginably horrific, but the infection had to be eradicated entirely, and the only way to ensure this was to take off some seemingly healthy tissue and make certain that it was indeed uninfected and that the skin left was entirely good. Trini painstakingly cut, and as she finished, she began the more delicate work of examining the deeper tissues.

Scraping the blade along the inside of the wound, Trini removed the possibly infected cells along the surface as well as the necrotic matter that had accumulated. Glancing up to wipe a wisp of hair from her eyes, she noticed Bear closing her eyes and looking away, though never abandoning her grip on the other. Seeing Bear's revolt, Trini felt her own stomach turn. Thankfully, all that remained was to rinse and bandage the lacerations.

The two switched places for that task. Bear busied herself with tenderly trickling the precious fluid through the newly purged area and Trini inspected the lash marks on Tay's legs. Pleasure flooded Trini's features as she noted the scabbing and signs of normal healing. Running her hands around the marks, none of the telltale heat of an infection radiated into her fingertips. She felt the muscles jump suddenly, and she looked into the face of weeping Tay. 

"I'm sorry." The words felt odd on her lips, almost eerily dated.

Tay blinked. A soft, wan smile caused her lips to barely turn up. "Thank you."

Trini cocked her head, questioning. "For the apology," clarified Tay. "And for all your help of course, but…" her voice trailed off weakly. Trini waited. "No one apologizes here," murmured Tay. "It made me feel…"

Trini felt inwardly that she ought to be able to complete the sentence, but for the life of her, she couldn't. She nodded her acknowledgement to Tay, and motioned to Bear, who had finished her ministrations. "Try not to press your back against anything," Trini instructed her patient, "it will help keep it from getting infected again." Tay met Trini's eyes, giving her consent to the advice. As Bear and Trini passed through the cell door, Trini heard a soft murmur.

"…human," it whispered. For the first time in her memory, Trini felt her eyes cloud with tears. The word felt homely, wonderful, and yet, Trini could not understand why it provoked such a deep reaction in her.

~*~

The palace was absolutely silent in the sweeping blackness that now passed as night upon Earth. Really, that was the way Rita preferred it. It had taken a while for her former servants such as Goldar to come to understand the concept of silence; however, a demonstration of her keen hand weaponry and skill in evisceration had certainly gone a long way in driving home the point. While the spell had done many things to mutate her personality while under its influence, her chronic, blinding headaches were one of the few things that had followed her through the spell and still remained. Right now, her head throbbed, and she shivered at a somewhat hazy remembrance of storming around the lunar castle shrieking about what a headache she had. _What a fool they made me out to be!_

Despite the pulsing pain in her temples, Rita wanted to think, and stalwart warrior that she was, she pushed the ache to the back of her mind and exerted a rigid control over her wandering thoughts. Catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror, she smiled slightly. She'd shed her ugly robes and conical hairstyle, and now dressed in a simple set of fitted dark robes with metallic linings that glittered despite their lack of color. Her hair fell in a straight flow down her back in a light shade, complimenting her pale skin. Viewing herself, she found herself pleased. Zedd, she knew, would have enjoyed such a pretty woman.

Thoughts of her late husband twisted the evil woman's lips slightly. Her liberation from the spell had been entirely accidental. _An evil commander who wants to live ought to watch what he says to whom more closely. Walls have ears! I shouldn't to have killed that maid…what was her name? Aisen, I think. I should have rewarded her and made her one of my courtesans. I believe she was quite evil enough to have made an excellent commander. Truly a pity she caught me while still half enspelled and furious._ Rita rolled her eyes slightly, making certain to keep her head very still so as not to shoot a blast of pain through her head that would come if she did so. _I wonder if these headaches are some sort of dissonance from the spell or having my powers fluctuating so much._

Rita sighed softly, glancing into the mirror again. Even through her pleasure at being lovely again, the reflection jarred her slightly. It was too similar to another woman. Certainly, Rita's eyes, a dark black, were nothing like the other woman's. Yet the paleness of her own hair brought to mind the thought of the girl she'd tried to turn evil. Rita remembered her with a shudder. The cat fiasco still bothered her mildly, mostly because it wounded her pride and rankled her. Not like the Green Ranger at all, she remembered Tommy rather fondly actually. _Would have been a sight better in my bed than Zedd!_ His unabashed evil made her proud. Spell-induced, of course, but the demonstration of his amazing capacity and aptitude for fighting forced her to give him at least a grudging respect as a fellow warrior. She still wished he'd been a woman at times, though. While Tommy was quite a handsome man, Rita had observed over the years that while men certainly ruled for strength, females, especially attractive ones, had a knack for disarming the leaders of opposition without firing a shot. _A sweet, gorgeous woman, and all too many of those men are out in no time._

Naturally, even the better evil seductresses couldn't take out the best of the male strategists and leaders, since those tended to be more focused on their plans than on women or had friends that found out the deception and saved them, but Rita had been surprised at the number of successes she'd had. Rita wasn't above using her feminine wiles, after all, she'd tricked Zedd into marrying her to get back into the lunar palace. Of course, it hadn't been only Rita's love potion.

_Zedd's spell came back to haunt him,_ she thought. Zedd had married Rita not only because of the love-potion Rita seduced him with, but also because his powers were being drained severely by his never-ending struggles with the Rangers. _Poor old Zeddy might have been evil and nasty, but he wasn't much of a strategist – ever_. Marrying Rita solved two problems. Zedd had worried that the spell, dependent on his and Master Vile's life forces, might be weakened by his constant power fluctuations. In addition, with Rita close, it made siphoning off her powers much more simple for him. 

Wincing, she pursed her lips and put a hand to her throbbing head. _If only my physiology worked like those humans' at least then I could take some blasted aspirin and feel better!_ Vengefully, Rita aimed a kick at a footstool within convenient striking distance. Listening to it crack against the wall, her vision went momentarily bright with pain at the loud noise, but she felt at least a bit more satisfied. Turning her thoughts back to her past, she briefly considered trying to find Katherine or Tommy. At least she'd be able to torment them. _Bring back some of their memories of being evil, drive them crazy._ Rita let out a soft but audible groan at that thought. _What the hell happened to me? I've never found such things particularly entertaining. Necessary, but I usually made Goldar or Finster take care of it. If they couldn't, I did, but that was a matter of expediency, not of personal pleasure. That's the kind of thing those dregs like Zedd and Gasket would indulge in! I'm a warrior. I annihilate my enemies or find ways to make them useful. Torturing them for long times just gives them longer to be rescued or escape._

Having the former rangers alive made Rita uneasy even with their memories wiped clean. It made her even further ill at ease to have three still unaccounted for. _If only I could just kill them…but they hold the key to this whole plan. I'd better check on the ones I have locations on soon. I don't trust those idiots I call foremen as far as I can kick them. The minute I don't have such a pounding headache, I believe I'll start._ One thing Rita knew from experience was never, ever to underestimate an enemy. And she felt that any enemy was much better off dead. _As soon as I'm finished with them, I'll kill them._ The thought comforted her slightly.

~*~

The Do'an section of the mines was considerably more dangerous and uncomfortable than other segments. Here, several workers had drowned during rainstorms when the caverns flooded without warning. The dungeons for prisoners were close to the section as well, and thus, workers often heard the cries from those. The rock had some veins of softer rock in it, and it was only in this segment that a few shafts had actually collapsed, burying workers and foremen alike. In the very deepest regions, dug down hundreds and hundreds of feet – the deepest tunnels that existed in the entire operation – magma occasionally spewed out of cracks if an unfortunate worker chiseled too far. It was also incredibly hot in the confining space with the molten rock bubbling not far from the surface, something that had killed many more. 

For the first time in his remembered existence, Adam found himself glad to be assigned to the section. The delicate chiseling he did took place in the top part of the mine where it was cooler, and down below, he could hear the sledges of the workers who were breaking rock to open up new shafts. Adam worked slowly. More slowly than was necessary certainly. It was his one little bit of defiance.

Hearing the foremen shout in the distance and the toll of a bell, he realized that his shift was over. Workers streamed past him. Most bent over, exhausted, the males' bare chests heaving, the women stained in sweat despite the cool air. Some were carried out by their comrades. One party that made its way past Adam bore a woman biting her lip so hard against the pain that a dark stream trickled out of one corner of her lips. He closed his eyes briefly against the hideous injury he saw: one of her legs was almost entirely severed. Shards of bone gleamed through the torn skin and muscle. Obviously, this had come from a cave-in of some sort, a sheer of rock crushing and tearing the flesh. Adam drew air in thinly through his nose, feeling faint and slightly nauseated. It was better than some of the burned workers he'd seen carried out, one man screaming, his foot still encased in hardened magma. Adam briefly drew his hands over his eyes to stop the images flooding his mind. This was not the time. 

Taking a deeper breath, Adam staggered after the group carrying the woman. Once he found himself outside, he silently slipped towards an outcropping of rock that threw deep shadows in the darkness against the lighting by the entrance. Reaching the darkness and safety, he bent over and vomited as quietly as he could. Sweat broke out everywhere. Spasms shook his body. Feverishly, Adam pushed his hair off of his face where it clung to his damp forehead. Collapsing against the dusty ground, he hugged it for a moment. Briefly, the spinning in his vision stopped. The support of the hard ground felt wonderful against his body and back. Trembling, he gritted his teeth and forced himself back to his knees, working his way to his feet. When would he ever learn to turn the other way, he wondered. Yet he found that often, that was impossible. Something in his mind recorded the tragedies in such vivid details, feeding a deep resistance in him. _Someone must remember these lives, _he thought. But why must it be me?

Hearing a sound close to him, Adam dropped into a defensive position almost as second nature. A hand closed across his mouth, and he tried to yell. "Shhh," hissed a familiar voice. 

Adam's instinct was to fight, but the hands released him and he calmed himself. "Tommy."

His eyes began to adjust to the darkness, and the slight form he could see nodded. 

"What in the…" Adam paused for a moment, unable to remember the words to complete the expression moments before he felt he remembered. He thought rapidly for something exclamatory to make his point. "Crap!" he finally expelled forcefully, finding the word annoyingly inaccurate to represent his thoughts. "What was that commando maneuver all about?"

A silence for a moment. "What's a commando?"

"I…I don't know" Adam confessed. He vaguely remembered using the term, but for the life of him, he couldn't think exactly what it was tangibly. "A…a fighter," he finished lamely, giving what little he could and feeling a dual pronged emotion of both frustration at his lack of knowledge and excitement that he'd remembered that much.

"Oh." Tommy still sounded slightly confused. Rushing on, Tommy kept his voice low and steady. "I guess I wanted to make sure you weren't trying to set me up. You'd have been rewarded for doing it. I figured if you had, the least I would do was make sure to take you down with me."

Adam raised his eyebrows slightly. The distrust was palpable in the air. "I didn't bring anyone," he muttered defensively. "I didn't know if you'd show or not."

Both men glared for an instant at each other. A fight might have broken out if it hadn't been for a sudden movement Adam saw out of the corner of his eye. Adam drew in his breath sharply. "What?" hissed Tommy, rightly interpreting Adam's instant change in demeanor as indicative of a larger threat.

"Behind you!" whispered Adam, dropping his voice to the lowest he could, all enmity forgotten for the moment. Tommy whirled around. Even in the shadows, both could see a shadow, with a dash of pale contrasting with the dark rocks near what Adam surmised to be the head of the figure, making its way down the face of the rock the mine entrances were cut into.

Instantly, Tommy dropped to the ground, blending in the best he could, and Adam followed suit. Barely daring to breathe, they observed as the shadowy figure reached the ground. "What do we do?" Adam whispered.

"We can't escape without being seen," breathed Tommy. "There's only one, I think."

Adam glanced around. "Me too. We should probably incapacitate him or her and get out of here." The instantaneous suggestion of violence within his mind surprised Adam. Instinctively, he knew _somewhere_ that he'd been told never to attack first. Pushing the thought aside, Adam let a steely determination flood him. In his mouth, Adam tasted a revolting metallic flavor that his mind told him was fear. Wiping it, he was surprised to see a dark smear appear against his pale arm.

"We'll attack…" Tommy paused, watching the figure draw closer and closer. "Now!" he hissed, springing forward.

Adam flung himself at the stranger. Tommy ducked low, aiming a sweeping kick at the figure's legs, sweeping them out. Within an instant, Adam grabbed at the neck, applying a hard pressure near the base, and on the sides in delicate pressure points, as he'd seen a foreman do to a particularly unfortunate worker. A strangled gasp rose from the intruder and then, silence. 

Tommy reached down and listened for a moment for breath sounds. Hearing them, he stood back up and faced Adam. "We don't have much time."

Adam was still staring at the prone figure, feeling ever so slightly guilty, though relieved at being able to ascertain the identity of the intruder. Bending down suddenly, he examined the paleness that gleamed in the darkness, pushing his fingers into the mass. A silkiness flowed around his hand. Lifting it slightly, Adam saw strands fall back to the still stranger. A dirty, but lovely lightly skinned face came into view as Adam pushed back locks of hair.

Aghast, Adam looked up at Tommy's shadowed face. "This is a woman," he whispered softly. "One of our race. Not a monster."

Tommy knelt as well, studying the girl. "Oh!" he gasped suddenly. "I know this woman."

~*~

The cells of the main dungeons were eerily silent at night. No moans or cries issued from them, for the jailers tended to force the prisoners into silence at night. While Rita had no problem particularly with torture, the silence stricture had a basis in a bad experience. Several of the workers in the closest barracks, demoralized by the terrified cries of their own people, had finally staged the best resistance they could raise, which was not much, but enough to destroy several guards and foremen. Not caring if they lived or died, it had been mostly a suicide mission as Rita learned when Goldar dragged one conspirator back and forced him to talk.

The revolt was of little consequence in the larger picture, and quickly crushed, but several of Rita's favorite toadies were casualties. Primarily inconvenienced at that moment, but seeing a dangerous trend, Rita put an immediate stop to those inspired to mutiny. The regulations on prisoners' silence during the night when the majority of her workers were in their barracks was the first, but she'd also executed several innocent people in front of her population, ruling her regime with a the hardest rod she could.

Though unafraid of the workers, and always well armed with her weapon of choice, a thin dueling rapier with a beautifully ornamented handle, Rita rarely walked among her people alone and undisguised. Certainly, trained for years by the most skilled in hand to hand combat, with an arsenal not only including the sword, but also a pair of small but lethal daggers, a coiled whip, and a small laser pistol, all hidden on her person, Rita could handle any that tried to assassinate her. As it were, few actually knew the Empress' true appearance. If Rita appeared in public as herself when issuing orders or presiding over an execution, she wore a heavily ornamented long gown with long sleeves, an elaborate diadem, a collar that came up to her chin, and a veil that obscured her hair and forehead. During those occasions, she also had a large number of guards and henchmen surrounding her.

Yet now, Rita strode unobtrusively and alone. Her pale hair she plaited into small braids that she then coiled around her head, giving the appearance of a small cap, a popular style among female workers with long hair. Her formerly clean skin sported a layer of dust and a few obvious smudges. Under her eyes, a darker substance she'd applied gave the illusion of circles. Even her gown, though less ripped and dirty than the average woman's, still blended. Walking, small puffs of dust kicked up at Rita's feet, further staining the hem of her garment. Even dressed as she was, Rita exuded an air of authority in her posture and withering gaze. 

Usually, Rita wanted to give an air of magnificence. Right now, though, she wanted no one, not even her closest, to know what she was doing. She didn't trust Goldar or even Finster to be able to approach the former Rangers without arousing suspicion. She had no intention of doing that. Even as she'd buried their colors, their memories, and everything associated with their former Rangerhood, one of the qualities that made Rita a powerful adversary was her attention to detail. "There must be nothing. _Nothing_. Nothing that could cause a memory to surface or bring back a familiar sensation." She muttered softly. Rita knew that she had to make sure her work continued unimpeded.

Glancing around sharply, Rita's dark eyes located the small entrance carved almost invisibly into the rock. She darted into the shadows, effectively disappearing, and then crawled through the tiny opening. When building the dungeons, Rita had had a few workers drill a hidden way in. Dispatching to their deaths the workers after their task was completed, she'd managed to keep it hidden through a network of spells, leaving Rita with an otherwise unknown way in. She'd been fairly proud of the feat, forced to rely on her own scant engineering skills. What she wouldn't have given to be able to pick the brain of her old enemy, the original Blue Ranger! Rita mused. The passage was uncomfortably small and narrow, but Rita persevered. Stepping silently down into a larger tunnel, she snuck towards the cell she'd ascertained the Ranger called Tanya to be in. 

~*~

"I think I finally have the maps," announced Billy, walking into the room the trio appropriated. He began laying out the enormous sheets of paper on the floor. 

"What are these?" asked Kim.

"Schematics, or blueprints if you will. Between the limited Power Chamber scanning resources and…well…" Billy sighed. 

"And?" asked Jason.

"I hacked, to be blatant. Rita doesn't have a centralized database or many computers. And what little she had encoded onto what I recognize as technology stolen from the vanquished Machine Empire, she'd fragmented and scattered. Frankly, it's pretty sophisticated."

Jason frowned. "What do you mean, sophisticated? Neither Rita nor Zedd were much into technology as I remember, beyond Zedd building Serpenterra. Rita went more for spells and force fields. I mean, Finster built monsters out of _clay_ for heaven's sakes."

"That's what I mean", said Billy, a worried look passing through his green eyes. "Either she's allied with someone, or she's a hell of a lot more intelligent than we ever gave her credit for."

"Zordon told us she was smart," Kimberly mused.

"I know, but guys, we're dealing with an adversary that now not only utilizes the Power, but also an immense amount of slave labor, some pretty advanced computer technology, and time and altering capabilities. Really, the only reason she doesn't use other means or more technological elements in her mining operations is that by focusing people into working and humiliation, she exerts better control. It's easier also than building an army of machines to do her dirty work, a la the Machine Empire. Not that she couldn't do it, it's just that she has an easy, expendable source of labor. She's also not about to give them technological implements that could be pulled apart and reformed as weapons."

"Shit." It was about the only thing Jason could come up with. This was not the Rita they'd dealt with as Rangers. Sure, Rita had been difficult at the time. Dangerous, too. But they'd always felt, or known even, inwardly, that they could keep her at bay. Even as the villains became stronger and tougher up to the Machine Empire, the Rangers had had some close scrapes, but never faced such an enemy. Jason rubbed his face. He was officially developing his first major headache.

Kimberly sat in an attitude of thought, studying the maps. "These are very extensive," she said, pointing at the mine tunnels.

Billy nodded. "From what I can gather, she's mining a specific crystalline element. It's a previously unknown element. I was able to steal a tiny sample, and this crystal is amazing. It's a wonderful conductor of power and holds it extraordinarily well. Not unlike the Zeo Crystal properties, except for a slightly different atomic structure, though in its raw form, the crystal isn't infused with powers."

Kim looked mildly confused. "I suspect she's going to make her own team of super warriors, even rangers. Even though she possesses an amazing amount of raw power, she can't transfer it until there's a medium to hold it. Like our power coins." Billy elaborated. 

"Zordon infused those by himself?" 

"Definitely. The Zeo Crystal as well, actually, is a very ancient work of Zordon's."

"How?"

"I've been pretty surprised. Zordon's a lot more powerful than we give him credit for. There are restrictions and rules for use of the power by beings other than Lei'risins. Simply, Zordon put his own powers into the coins and crystal, then created Ranger teams. Over several millennia, the Zeo Crystal and Green Morphin' Coin were lost."

"WAIT!" cried Kim suddenly at the mention of the Green Coin. "The colors. If the powers are linked to color, then how is Rita going to make Rangers?"

Jason nodded emphatically, following closely. Billy responded. "Simply put, she's not just yet. She'll have to restore color before she can create a team."

"How?" asked Jason. "Because, if we can restore the colors, then we could fight."

Billy drew a deep breath. "I honestly don't know. More bad news, guys. The thing is, we've gotten all we can out of the Power Chamber for the most part. There's not enough energy in the back-up cells to run more scans, and I doubt they'd do any good in any case. We need to make a decision."

Jason shook his head. "That's already been decided. We go out and find our friends."

"What are we going to do out there?" questioned Kimberly.

"Whatever we can. I don't know that it's much more than die alongside the others and take some henchmen down with us. But I'm hoping that we can scout around undetected for awhile, and maybe find a chink in Rita's armor. It's not a big chance, but what else can we do? At least we have some good information and our memories."

"I concur, Jason. It's our only chance."

"We never thought we'd beat Ivan Ooze!" added Kimberly confidently. "Sometimes, you've just got to try and pray and hope that it all works out."

Jason nodded. Billy cracked a smile. "Then we need to study these schematics and use the small reserve in the back-up cells that's not needed to keep Alpha and Zordon alive to synthesize a few supplies. We're pretty much out of time on the cells, and we'll have to leave soon."

"If we can," said Jason, "We'll shoot for departure in two days. Now, what are we going to need, and what's the geography."

The trio's voices rose and fell, audible in the main chamber. Zordon smiled. "We chose well," he remarked to the small robot. 

**To be Continued**

  


"Ai-yi-yi, Zordon, I hope so. Ai-yi-yi-yi-yi!"

  


_Well, thanks for reading! I'm planning to get that next chapter up soon. Feedback is always, always appreciated. If you want to email me, I'm at ladyevenstar120@yahoo.com. Thanks._


	7. A Strange Occurence

****

Prism

Standard disclaimers apply…I don't own them.

Well, yet another long interval between updates…I swear I'm trying to get better about it, but real life keeps getting in the way. From here, though, I'm going to try to discipline myself to update once a week. 

The trio plodded slowly along the bleak desert, devoid of its usual warm colors, away from the relative safety of the Power Chamber. Kim rubbed her eyes, which were stinging badly. Ostensibly, the dust kicking up from their feet and blowing into her eyes was causing the problem, but deep down, she knew this was not the case. Her emotional equilibrium had been doing roller-coasters for the last several days, and right now, she was in the middle of another downswing. _This is worse than P.M.S._ she thought, then feeling guilty for comparing such a life-altering event to a once a month nuisance. She slowly blew the air out of her lungs and drew a deep breath. Kim didn't know what to think any more. For once, she knew, she was glad that she could not see herself. It was bad enough seeing Billy and Jason in the terrible monochrome. The blonde boy's hair looked gray in the light, while Jason's pallor appeared distinctly unhealthy. Seeing herself, her hair artificially grayed, her skin pasty would have, she suspected, been the last straw that would sever her from sanity.

Kim felt lethargic, as though she had just finished a difficult practice or a Ranger battle. She wasn't sure where the physical exhaustion came from. Despite the situation, she slept well and rested. Even that hadn't helped. Kim wondered if the problem was simply her emotional state. _Well,_ she encouraged herself, _ don't give up. Tommy_ - here she felt a pang stab her heart - _needs you._ Her heart grumbled softly when she refused to think further about her ex. She ignored it and shoved it to the back of her mind. The last thing she needed was to deal with her Tommy issues.

"Damn!" she heard Billy curse sharply as he stumbled over a rock. Kim turned, slightly surprised. Having known Billy for over ten years, she had seen him annoyed, frustrated, irate, and everything in between, but she had never heard him curse so much. In fact, she realized, up until the last couple of days, she had heard exactly two curse words out of him – one during the body-switching episode (she had never realized that her quiet friend was even capable of such a colorful oath) and one when he was working on a zord and cracked his head trying to stand up. Recently…well, it wasn't Billy, Kim mused. She made a mental note to keep an eye on him. Something was severely wrong there.

Thinking that, she nearly burst into hysterical giggles. Something wrong! Everything was wrong. She knew, however, that it would bother both boys and cost them time, thus, she forced the screeching laughter down, then noted Jason staring at her with a concerned look. "Is something wrong?" he asked.

Kim couldn't take it – the wording of Jason's question was so perfectly set to what she had been mulling over that the pent-up laughter burst out in a tide. Kim fell to her knees. Her stomach hurt from laughing so hard, but she couldn't stop. "I'm sorry, Jase," she gasped. "I swear, it's…" and she launched into another round. 

Jason and Billy both simply stared. "Kim?" Billy said gingerly. Kimberly looked up, and seeing his face, one of the key ingredients to the whole mix, laughed even harder. The guys looked at each other uncomfortably. It was obvious that Kim was in trouble, and they began to wonder what they needed to do.

"Kim, we can send you back to the Power Chamber and go on alone," Jason offered solicitously. "Either that or we can go back together and start again tomorrow." Either option would cause costly delays, but Jason knew, as a leader, that having a weak link was dangerous as well. He had never expected this from Kimberly, strong as a rock and the emotional center of the first team. 

"No, no, it's okay now." Kim got up, brushed off her backside, and exhaled. "Sorry. I really don't know what that was." All she knew was that she suddenly felt better, like a load had been lifted from her. 

"Kim," said Jason seriously, hating his role as the leader now more than ever, but some things needed to be said. "Are you honestly certain that you are going to be all right? We need you, but we also can't afford to have this happening." He winced slightly at the harshness in his tone.

"I know," Kim murmured, calmer now. She noticed that Billy hadn't spoken, but rather, was leaning against a rock formation in a distinctly annoyed posture. "Billy?" His name like a jolt, Billy looked up, feeling a seething anger bubbling in himself, much to his mortification and surprise. _What is WRONG with me?_ After all, it was Kimberly, one of his best friends. It wasn't as if he'd never done stupid things or been the weakest member of a team, he thought silently. 

Kim recoiled, seeing the clouds in his pale eyes. Jason put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "What's going on, Bill?" he asked calmly, feeling Kim's surprise and hurt radiating from her. "I know the present situation, obviously, but you've been acting…different…since I came to see you on Aquitar."

"Nothing," Billy lied. There were too many emotions swirling in him. He did not want to deal with the issues. Yet, he felt them nudging him. Cestria …aging…the situation that had prompted him to leave Earth…all muddled together to create, simply, a mess. He was uncomfortably aware that he needed to talk to Kimberly and Jason, to be honest, but years of training subverted the impulse.

Jason snorted, a snort that sounded curiously like "bullshit", but Billy consciously chose to ignore it. Right now, they did not have time to deal with these things. "We need to get to that cave by tonight," Billy pointed out, changing the subject. "It's only about three more miles, but it's rough terrain and then a good climb up a small cliff to the entrance. That cave is our only chance for shelter, and I don't want to sleep out here on the sand tonight."

Kim and Jason heartily agreed. The desert got very cold at night, and the wind would make it unbearable. Even a cave seemed preferable to the elements, and perhaps, if it was safe, they might even have a small fire for cooking and warmth. Not so out on the open sand.

Jason looked closely at his two comrades. Kim's face was drawn and wind-burned. _How do we stand a chance if this is the best we have? We haven't even really started and we're already exhausted and heartsick. How will we ever have the strength to defeat Rita?_. For himself, he was already trying to force himself to ignore the physical and mental difficulties. It didn't help, he realized, that every time he began to think about those that would need to be rescued, a certain face popped into his mind. A very pretty, fair face that ordinarily would have held sparkling blue eyes and been surrounded by pale blonde hair. _Shut up,_he threatened his mutinous mind. _I do NOT need to be thinking about her_. His mind ignored him, and suddenly, Jason was conscious that his body had reacted in very…inappropriate…ways. Turning to cover his embarrassment and other…reactions, Jason sighed gruffly. "We need to get going, then." He hiked quickly, hoping to force himself to concentrate on other things.

Billy and Kim followed bemusedly, neither having noticed anything particularly amiss. Jason's thoughts turned in turmoil. Billy _needed_ to talk, he realized, and he felt awful that he couldn't extend a more sincere invitation. He was honestly afraid that the stress they were under would crack Billy if Billy didn't vent, but at the same time, losing precious time to hash things through during this whole process wasn't an option. There were a very limited amount of supplies, and thus, a limited time they had to do…whatever it was they were going to do. The lack of a coherent plan also disturbed Jason. Talking it over during the last few days, they'd come up with some definites – they would hike to the mining settlements, staying hidden, and try to locate the others. However, there was little they could plan. They had no idea how the others might react, and no idea what kinds of delays or trouble they could run into. There was also the possibility of being captured, a thought which turned Jason's blood cold. There was no doubt that Rita was looking for them, after a hearing transmission Alpha had luckily intercepted.

After some hours and innumerable stumbles, cuts and bruises, the trio at last located the cliff and the tiny entrance to the cave peeping out of the rock face. It was only about a twenty-foot climb up, but at the instant, that seemed almost insurmountable to the exhausted young people. "I'll go first," Jason volunteered, "and check to make sure there's nothing in the cave."

"We checked it before we left," Billy asserted, "and according to scans, it's empty."

"Still," said Jason. "We left a significant time ago and if there's any kind of cloaking spell…" His words trailed off.

Billy conceded. Jason was right, of course, and he was acting slipshod. "Okay," he said aloud, "I'll spot you the best I can. Ready?" 

Jason boosted himself using the hand and footholds in the side of the cliff. They were readily available, and it was a much easier climb than ones he'd done in the past. However, climbing with no ropes was unnerving and left no room for error. "Jase!" He heard Billy call. "Don't grab the handhold to your right, it's not steady. I saw it move when you grabbed close to it." Jason grunted with effort and changed his hold. He was glad that Billy was watching, helping him map the best route. Jason's entire focus was on his sore muscles and just pulling himself up. 

At last, Jason reached the entrance and hoisted himself in. Protected from view by a sheer of rock, he stood up and looked around. It was a fairly small cave, but plenty large enough for three people. Checking it carefully, he evicted a small snake from hiding, but beyond that, there were no signs of life.

Billy and Kim had seated themselves on convenient boulders to wait for Jason's okay. Looking up, they saw the dark head sticking out of the rock face from the cave. "It's fine," called Jason as quietly as he could, so as not to attract attention. 

"Go ahead," Billy motioned to Kimberly. Kim slowly began her ascent. However, it was uneventful and she quickly disappeared into the entrance. Billy stared up at the cliff. He took hold of a rock that protruded from the side, put his weight on it, and began to climb. 

Billy was so concentrated on the strenuous task that he failed to notice the sudden silence that had fallen around him. Though the desert had comparatively few noises, all through their hike, the wind had been whipping around them, and there had been rustlings from animals and their footsteps. It was only when he felt a rock shift under his hand that he realized that something was incredibly wrong. By then, it was too late.

The rock before him opened, and he fell hard into the passage, tumbling down and down. At last, Billy landed hard on his face and arm and slowly, and he lay there for what seemed an eternity to him before he finally gasped, his lungs filling with air and he shifted to a slightly more comfortable position to figure out where he was. Taking stock of his injuries, he became aware that blood was trickling out of his nose where he had hit it, and that his lip was bleeding as well. His arm throbbed. Gingerly, he pressed it, carefully checking to see if there were any breaks. Though his wrist was already swelling badly, Billy didn't think that any of the bones had broken. 

Checking his other arm and legs, he sighed with relief. Other than some massive lacerations and what he knew would soon turn to bruises, he appeared okay. His left arm was entirely intact, for which he was immensely grateful. Being left-handed, he knew that without his arm, he could not hope to climb out and find Kim and Jason. Doing it one handed would be tricky enough. He smiled slightly as he felt himself…feeling surprisingly pleasant and light. _I must be concussed,_ Billy thought to himself. Billy sighed sleepily and yawned. Jason had…Billy struggled with random thoughts that floated through his mind_I must not fall asleep_, screamed a conscious part of his mind…he, Billy, had been concussed from a lucky shot from a putty once, and he recognized the feeling. Billy felt himself drifting hard, away from that random memory that had surfaced. His eyes began to close, and only by a sheer force of will did he keep them open. 

_I must…get out…warn the others…_ Billy's thoughts spurred him towards action, though his sluggish mind was loathe to push his body into motion. Billy crawled, his nose still dripping wet, salty blood onto the rock below him. Slowly, he made his way up the tunnel. He saw light ahead. _I must not have tumbled as far as I thought_ he thought. It was the last conscious thing his brain eked out before he felt the light envelop him.

~*~

"Billy!" 

"Owwww," Billy grunted, unable to process what was happening. A small hand was smacking him lightly on the cheek, forcing him to pay attention to the annoying, humming sound of the voice above.

"Stop ihhh," he slurred, thinking that if he could have gotten up right then, he would have put a stop to such treatment. All he wanted was to sleep. 

Jason glanced at Kimberly nervously. All they knew was that they'd seen Billy begin climbing, then fall backwards onto the ground. Jason's mind did a double take suddenly. _Wait. Billy fell BACKWARDS. How did he get cuts and a bloody nose on his FRONT?_ Something was screwy, thought Jason.

"Billy, you need to stay awake," Jason said, kneeling by his friend and repeating the obvious. 

The pale eyes opened slowly, and began to register the surroundings. As Billy's throbbing head returned to full consciousness, he sighed. "Oh, man."

"What happened?" inquired Jason. "Did you slip?"

As the strange episode flashed back into Billy's mind, he stared at Jason and Kimberly, his brain suddenly working quickly and reasoning. "There's a dimensional gap or entrance or something there."

"What?" said Kimberly, disbelieving.

"I fell into a passage," said Billy, inwardly musing what this might mean for them. "I don't know where it led, I didn't check, I just tried to get back out." Gingerly, he cradled his arm. "I think I sprained my wrist in the fall."

"Let me see," demanded Kim, having taken several courses in medical training. In her mind, it was first things first. They could explore the meaning of a secret passage in a minute, but Billy needed taken care of. Carefully, she poked and prodded, ignoring Billy's winces. "Well," she announced, "you're right. I don't think it's broken unless it's a hairline fracture. You must have twisted it when you fell."

Meanwhile, Jason's mind was going at full tilt. A secret passage? He began weighing the options. They could go in it and check it out…or they could continue with their current plan to stay the night and keep heading towards the mines. Jason worried that the passage would be guarded or booby-trapped or a dead-end, any of which could endanger them. He looked at the other two. "What do you think?" he inquired of his companions finally. After all, it was their lives as well as his.

Kim caught his eye and saw the worry reflected in it. "I have mixed feelings," she said finally. "What if it's a trap, or guarded?" she echoed Jason's thoughts. 

"Billy?" said Jason. "Did you see anything?"

Billy wanted to kick himself. He'd been so preoccupied with getting out and his injuries that he hadn't even checked for a possible lead or dangers. "No," he admitted shamefacedly, "I didn't even think about it."

"That's okay, bro," said Jason gently. "I'd have wanted to get out of there as fast as possible. But we are still left with a decision to be made."

"I vote we take it," Kimberly spoke up unexpectedly. "We have no better plan or option. If it's trapped or guarded, it can't be more so than the areas around the mines." She felt reinvigorated with this new discovery. Perhaps they would get somewhere after all.

Billy nodded, less resolutely than Kim, but still in concurrence. "I suppose," he said slowly, "Kim is right. I'm just not thrilled about going back in there."

"Understood," said Jason. "But I also think we had better explore this possibility. How did you find it?"

"I don't know," said Billy. "It was so strange. One moment I was climbing, the next, it was deadly still. Like, eerily so – kind of like the moment right before a huge thunderclap. Then I fell into the tunnel."

Jason looked up the cliff. "Okay," he said. "I'm going to try to find this entrance. Watch me carefully so we can figure out where it is and how one gets in. It's going to be a trial and error thing, I think." He climbed up the face of the rock, slowly pushing, pulling, and tapping parts. However, no door opened, nor did he fall into the cliff.

After several hours during which Billy and Kimberly each took a turn searching with no luck, the exhausted teens climbed into the original shelter of the cave.

"Well, that was fruitless," complained Billy. "But I swear it was there!"

"I know," said Jason, more musing out loud than responding to Billy's vehement statement. "You fell on your back when we saw you fall, but all your injuries were to your front. There was no way you could have gotten them unless you fell forward onto some rocks or other objects first."

Mollified, Billy rewarded Jason with a wry but genuine smile. "We'll look some more tomorrow," said Jason. "For now, we'd better eat and such."

"Shhh!" Kimberly's sharp whisper interrupted them. The petite girl was at the entrance of the cave lying on her stomach, looking down through the narrow, sheltered opening. There was something very urgent in the tone that alerted both young men, who slowly crept beside her to look.

Below them, out of the side of the cliff, emerged a woman with long, pale hair. The woman deftly climbed down and quickly began walking away, then disappeared behind a group of rocks at last. The three lay, staring, and transfixed. At last Kim found her voice. "Was that Kat?" she whispered just in case someone was still there.

"No," Jason whispered back. "Kat's taller. And that women didn't have the long-legged build that Katherine does."

To be continued…


	8. Musings

**Prism**

_Standard Disclaimers apply…I don't own them, wish I did, and thus am receiving no financial compensation for my writing. _

_Well, I said I was going to update once a week (laughs wryly). But, I'm getting ready to graduate from college, get married, and join the 'real world', and as usual, those things take up time - particularly the wicked hard chemistry class I'm taking right now to finish my science credit. So updates to this will probably be sporadic. But I'm trying…I promise._

Kimberly remembered going to cheerleading camp as a young teen and listening to the other girls tell ghost stories. She hadn't admitted it to anyone, but she had been scared badly and had nightmares. She now felt the same, creeping chill going up her spine and resisted the urge to put her hand on either Jason or Billy's arm to remind herself that her two friends were there and were flesh and blood, not phantoms of a nightmare. She shook herself slightly to try to escape the feeling, but she couldn't. Kim felt vulnerable now. Not that she hadn't before, but only this close call to discovery had put all her senses on alert and her fear to rise.

Jason let out a long, slow breath. "What _was_ that?" he whispered, barely audible even to himself. Jason tried to force himself to remember that at the moment, he was probably a little spooked and his senses weren't necessarily to be trusted, but he had gotten a distinct aura of menace from the woman. Whoever or whatever she was, she instantly tripped his instinctual responses, and he wasn't willing to discount that entirely. He had rarely been wrong about people even before becoming a ranger, but since then, Jason knew that the instinct had only been honed further.

Jason slowly turned his head to survey his companions, trying not to make a sudden movement that might startle them into making a noise and giving away their position to anyone who might be listening. Billy's face, ashen in the dim, ghostly light, was unreadable. His pale eyes followed the course the woman had taken, scouring it as though a detective looking for clues. "Footsteps", Billy finally murmured in an undertone, almost to himself.

"What?" hissed Kim.

"Footsteps," Billy repeated. "She is not a figment of our collective imagination or hallucination, whichever you prefer. Ghosts or hallucinations do not leave footprints in the sand."

Jason took this in for a moment, mulling it over. There was no doubt in his mind that the woman had been real. Billy's bizarre accident and ramblings about a secret passage only confirmed to him that a physical being had come out of the cave. However, there was no denying that his mind had also automatically jumped to the spooky stories he had heard throughout his life at the woman's emergence. Billy, as usual, seemed to have put his finger on their collective pulse and answered their unasked question.

Swallowing hard, Jason tried to pull himself together, force his heart to stop racing, and assume his unspoken role as leader. "Okay," he said softly, to break the thrall over all of them. "That was…weird."

"Decidedly strange," Billy muttered quietly.

Seeing that none of this preamble was getting them anywhere, Kimberly cut straight to the point. "Are we, like, staying here?" she asked, reverting in her agitation to a quirk in her speech she had long abandoned. "I, for one, am completely freaked out."

"If we move, I'm not sure where we'll go," admitted Jason. "We could head to the mines now, but we're mentally and physically exhausted. And we're probably not going to be as on our guard as we need to be."

"I concur," said Billy firmly. His role had nearly always been as a de facto second in command, first to Jason once Billy's skills fighting and thinking had improved, then to Tommy. It was a comfortable position for him, and he slipped back into it without another thought. "I believe we must stay the night here. It will be too dark for travel soon in our condition. However, we ought to appoint watches so that at least one person will remain awake for any…unpleasant visitors."

Decision made, the lucky two lay down to sleep, too tired to protest further or even to take a meager supper from their provisions. Billy sat at the entrance, hidden but alert. He had volunteered for the first watch, desperately needing to sort out some thoughts before he could even consider sleep. He yawned, his body making its exhaustion palpable, but his mind whirled. Though Billy had faced his own mortality before, it had always been in situations where dying was a _possibility ._ Not that that hadn't been terrifying enough, but there had always been a chance of getting out of it through some sort of weapon or a miraculous cure. He rubbed his left knee, which had a deep ache in it. That, now that he was thinking of it, was one of the few things that the Aquitians hadn't been able to cure for all their advancement, a memento of his narrow escapes. Billy still had a touch of arthritis from his sojourn into aging that acted up when he exerted himself too much.

Remembering Delphine's admonition to him to be more careful about the lasting scars from his rapid aging, Billy suppressed a slight snort, bringing him back to the present. He had no choice but to keep going, no matter how bad it was for his knee. This was, he mused, the first time he had faced a situation of _certain_ death. He had long ago made his peace during his time as a ranger that he could die in the heat of battle or from one of the spells, had faced down death and won, but now the specter came back, looming greater than ever. Billy supposed this was how people awaiting execution felt, or prisoners in war.

Sitting and sorting through his musings a bit further, Billy realized he wasn't scared of death, per se, and even now, as he sat watching the night, he knew he still wasn't afraid of dying. More, he concluded, it was the realization of imminent death that made him hyperaware that he hadn't thought it would come this way to him. In any case of his premature death in battle, Billy had always had the utmost faith that somehow his fellow rangers or Zordon or _someone _would save the earth even if he perished. Now, he would die, but it would be without that faith. Billy felt that loss keenly, fearing that far more than death itself. As far as he was concerned, to see his home in this state, with his friends enslaved and tortured was as bad as any hell could offer.

_My friends _, he mused. _What about my father? He wasn't a ranger, so there is no way that the Power Chamber in its limited capacity could trace him. I wonder what became of him. If he's alive…or dead…or captive and tortured. I don't know what would be worse. _His stomach twisted at the thought of his father being forced to work in a mine. _If only I didn't know…_Billy tried to stop the thoughts from coming into his mind, but he was powerless against them.

_I never realized…humans are not the only ones who fight amongst themselves. I knew when I went to Aquitar that of course they were being attacked by the HydroContaminators, but I always figured them as far more civilized than human beings. So many dead…so much anger. The Aquitian rangers bore the brunt of it. They were supposed to have 'intervened sooner' or 'worked faster' or anything, really. Some of the survivors of the attack were half-deranged from the loss of their families, their homes…_Billy had to consciously suppress a shudder at the memory. He had gone, he had worked, and his reward had been wrath piled on his shoulders.

_The Aquitians were never much for showing emotions. Maybe that's why I was so shocked to see those…out of control. They broke all the cultural taboos, laws, everything. And I, I was shunted off to the side…it wasn't my battle to fight, my peace to restore. It was like…like…being on…Earth… _Billy stopped himself. He refused to allow himself even the slightest thought of disloyalty to either the Aquitians, who had, frankly, saved his life during the uprising so vivid at the moment in his memory, or to his Earth Rangers, his friends in the current situation of great trouble. He gritted his teeth, breathed deeply to keep the tears in his eyes from streaming down his face.

At that moment, Billy felt more awkwardly childish than he had in many years. He wanted very desperately to sob aloud, as though he was still the young outcast he once had been, the half-orphaned child. Over the years, it had become a greater shame to him to allow even the smallest moment of weakness whether emotional or physical. So many painful fights, doctoring his own bruises, and hiding them from his father…teaching himself not to cry, not to complain, had been the only way to combat the bullies' assertions that he was a baby, a geek, a nerd. Billy stared out into the night, watching blankly for any danger, still forcing himself to be stalwart. He had a job to do now, and tears could not blur his vision, for he felt that any moment, danger could present itself. He did not catch the irony of his need to prove himself, even with his best of friends, to refuse trust, yet again.

Jason slept fitfully, interrupted by the occasional ragged breath he could hear from the entrance of the cave where Billy sat watch. It pained him to feel the hurt his friend was going through. As a child, he remembered overhearing his mother speaking with Zach's one time about Billy. "I wonder if he'll ever trust," he remembered his mother saying. "I wish I could help, but the only thing I can give him is safety and love."

Jason understood his mother's wishful sigh. Billy had opened up so much since then, but there were still certain things Jason knew his friend _never_ spoke about. Sometimes Jason had been able to draw them out, but in the moments of deepest agony, Billy remained silent, inscrutable, refusing to ever allow himself release or to cry out. Jason understood this was one of those. And yet, he couldn't help himself. "Billy," he said, sitting up, "it's my turn for watch?" It came out as a question.

Billy started slightly, but quickly regained control. "Yes." Belatedly, he realized how bleary and sleepy he was, how even though at some level, he would have been content to watch all night, he wasn't alert enough now. And he refused to be the weak link that allowed danger in. "I'm exhausted," he muttered with an enormous yawn.

In the pale moonlight, Billy could just barely make out Jason's wry smile at the obviousness of the statement. Too tired to think of any kind of joke or repartee, he simply returned the glance, and crawled over into a blanket. Even though the ground was hard and the cave cool in the night, he was asleep even as his head drooped into the dirt of the cave floor.

Sitting at the entrance of the cave, Jason shivered with cold. Readjusting had caused him to lose some of the carefully trapped body heat he'd conserved by remaining in one spot and wrapping completely in his blanket. Even so, he was grateful. The cold had sharpened his sleep-dulled senses, putting him on a high state of alert.

As he watched over the desert, he allowed himself the brief luxury of a stretch of his stiff muscles. Feeling them scream in protest, he pinpointed a feeling the physical pain produced in him. He fought, warring in his mind against it. It had never been a part of his life as a leader, or a part of his life even as a civilian, he realized. For the first time in many years, Jason realized he was afraid. Very afraid. _If I screw up…if I lose Billy and Kim…_The familiar burden of responsibility settled heavy on him. This time, it felt far heavier a weight than he'd ever had before.

_We're fighting a losing battle_, he realized, _and I've never been a good loser. I'm not starting now, either. _Jason struggled against the defeatist attitude that he realized had settled into him to an extent over the last several days. Even despite his grim motivating of the other two, his refusal to allow Rita possession over Earth…he recognized that in the depths of his private soul, he felt lost. _I can't even get through to the guy I call one of my best friends _he thought, angry at his own impotence. _I can't even protect any of the others, or Billy or Kim._ Suddenly, Jason fought a soft laugh. If Kimberly had read his thoughts on that one, Jason had no doubt she would have kicked his butt. He could remember her huffing one time at Tommy, injured after an admittedly slightly stupid stunt to protect her: "Just because I'm small…you're always telling your classes that size doesn't matter. Well, it's no wonder they don't always believe it! You sure don't seem to!" With that, she'd stomped off, leaving a be- and amused Tommy on the medical bed.

Jason had always tried to remember that Zordon never would have chosen the girls for the team if they couldn't protect themselves and function as full team members, but even so, sometimes, that had been hard. He didn't think of himself as inherently sexist, but he supposed, to a degree that his parents' warnings and lectures never to treat women badly along with his innate personality had always made him want to protect anyone smaller than himself, and Kim _did _look vulnerable. _Of course, that's before I saw her kick putty ass ,_ thought Jason unable to suppress some slight mirth at the unorthodox juxtaposition of Kim disposing of a large number of putties then squealing "Ohmygosh! My hair is so RUINED!" as she had after one fight. Kim put up a pretty good façade, but she was a formidable person when pissed.

Thinking about Kim's penchant for suitably putting the boys in their places when they became too overprotective made Jason think of Tanya, the yellow Zeo ranger as well. The woman had a dead-on sense of accuracy when seeking a mild and usually funny form of revenge, and yet, Jason remembered, Tanya was a very kind person, not overstepping any boundaries into embarrassing someone or upsetting them with the jokes.

This brought his thoughts around to Katherine, besides Trini the only other female he had served with. Kat, as he recalled, had never had quite the outrageousness that accompanied Tanya (and, from what Jason had been told, Aisha), nor quite the cool sense of humor Trini had always possessed. Katherine was…well…a sweetheart. Jason remembered that she had never had the straight face to pull her through anything she was involved in. A slight smile she would attempt to suppress would cross her face, then become more and more obvious until she was laughing and had entirely given away any involvement she had with a joke. Jason had found it quite…endearing.

Yanking his mind away from his friends' laughter, Jason shivered again. Before he could think any further, he heard a small voice from the inner sanctum of the cave. "Are you alright?" Soon, the petite woman had crawled over to his side. Jason, looking back, saw Billy sit up briefly, awakened at Kimberly's voice, and then fall back and roll over to go back to sleep when it was apparent there was no danger and he was not needed at that moment.

Jason smiled slightly, darkly. "I was thinking about you, actually," he admitted. "And Tanya, and Katherine."

"Oh?"

"How mad you would get when us guys were too overprotective - and your senses of humor in dealing with it," he clarified.

Kim rolled her eyes and shook her head. "And goodness knows it happened enough," she grumbled, a touch of suppressed mirth in her voice. "None of you – ever – gave it up either."

Jason shook his head. "Nope. And no matter how many practical jokes you play or lectures you give, I doubt it'll happen."

"A bit of a nonsensical train of thought to get started on in the current…well, conditions."

p Jason sighed. "It was easier than thinking about…what's happening…now." The words were strained in his throat. "Easier than being…defeated." The last came out as a whisper of intense pain.

Kimberly leaned over and hugged her friend. There were times for words, but there were also times when only physical contact would do to express a sentiment. "I know, Jason," she said quietly. "But we're still alive…still free. There's still a chance, still hope. There's always hope."

"What if there isn't this time?" Jason asked bitterly, giving voice to the thoughts that had dogged him even as he'd tried to inspire Billy and Kim and ignore the deeper chasms of his own doubt. In this moment, however, he knew he desperately needed reassurance. "What if…" he trailed off.

"There is." There was strength to Kim's voice, a steely quality Jason recognized as Kimberly's core of belief showing itself. "There has to be." Suddenly, she touched his hand lightly, as if coming out of a brief trance at the echo of her own words. "Jason, you need to go sleep. I'll watch. It's my turn. You won't do us any good exhausted. And," there was urgency in her voice now, "we _need _you. None of us can do it on our own. It's either all three of us working together, or you're right, all hope _is _lost."

With that, Kimberly sat, looking straight ahead. Beside her, she felt Jason stir and crawl back over to the sleeping space, obviously too tired to argue. Kim soon heard the soft sound of heavy breathing in sleep and knew that Jason and Billy both slept, peacefully, she hoped. In the meanwhile, she tried to keep her mind alert and focused. Slowly, she became aware that she wasn't really physically tired but that a high anxiety was playing on her already taut nerve strings.

At first, Kimberly thought she was afraid of what might happen to them. Examining closer, she realized that she _was_ afraid of the earth being forever destroyed by Rita, but that what was sapping her now was a more common case of the shivers. She wasn't so much afraid per se, as spooked, with the telltale nervous chills clustering at the base of her spine. Kim had always hated ghost stories. They usually scared her badly, even when she wouldn't admit it. The emergence of the woman had reawakened some old phobias within her, and, improbably, was causing her to think of every scary movie she'd ever watched.

Kim tried to remind herself that Billy and Jason were right behind her, that if anything tried to harm her, they would be at her aid within a split second. She was very jumpy though, this she recognized. _Get a grip, Kimberly Anne Hart!_ she mentally commanded herself. _This is sooooooooo stupid!_ To take her mind off the shivers crawling up and down her spine, she forced herself to look out over the desert, to watch carefully. In the east, she noted a wisp of light across the sky. Daylight was coming, thank heaven, she realized. Soon, at least the nightmare of this night would be over. She refused to think of the many nightmare darks that lay ahead of her and what those might contain. Kim knew she'd feel, however improbably, better when dawn broke.

From far away, a faint sound broke across the desert. Looking out, Kim could see lights far away in the mining settlements flickering on. From the solid looking rock faces near the lights, movement began to hum as what Kim assumed to be people spilled out and others began to pour in. She was too far away to make out individual people, just the mass moving out from the face. For an instant, true fear seized her: what if she and her friends could be spotted from over at the mines by an astute worker. Then she remembered that distances in the desert often looked far closer than they were in actuality. She couldn't hardly make out the entrances or exits to the mines, which she was sure had to be far larger than the cave's entrance. She couldn't even make out actual people. All these things reassured her that they were, indeed, as safe as they could be under the circumstances.

Kimberly yawned, relaxing slightly. Her vigilance, however, continued. Watching the workers' movement in and out of the mine bothered her deeply. Perhaps, she reflected, her concern was far less even than that. For the first time in many months, she thought about Tommy. Seeing him enslaved, that proud, strong man, had wounded her in a way nothing else had. It wasn't, she amended to herself, that she wouldn't have been just as concerned if Tommy had been with them, and it would have raised another set of issues for her. But seeing him in such a condition had cut her to the quick, and silently, she realized that regardless of how she had reassured Jason earlier, if there was one pivotal image that could on one hand inspire her extraordinary hope and on the other cause her to sink into the mires of doubt and despair, that was it. Kimberly was not a terribly religious person, but now, she issued a heartfelt prayer to whoever might listen and come to her aid. _Please, God,_ she prayed, _If we must die, let us do so before we lose our hope and dignity. And _she added to herself, _I'm not going down without a fight._

Nothing seemed to answer her declaration. Yet, Kim felt succored by her own defiance, even if it was a little anticlimactic. As she stared out over the desert, she dared someone to answer her prayer. Just as she thought nothing would happen, a brief movement below the entrance of the cave caught her eye.

_To Be Continued_


End file.
